UEFA was forced to declare the Champions League draw null and void after a series of mistakes were made during the process in Switzerland on Monday morning.
Manchester United had been handed a tough last-16 tie against Paris St Germain — but only after being erroneously paired with Villarreal and then mistakenly left off the list of possible opponents to face Atletico Madrid.
The Athletic understands that after numerous clubs sought urgent clarification on what had happened, UEFA decided to declare the initial draw void. The ties will be redrawn at 2pm on Monday.
UEFA said in a statement: “Following a technical problem with the software of an external service provider that instructs the officials as to which teams are eligible to play each other, a material error occurred in the draw for the UEFA Champions League Round of 16.
“As a result of this, the draw has been declared void and will be entirely redone at 1500 CET.”
As the initial draw was made in Nyon there was a hiccup when Villarreal were initially drawn against United. But the two teams had already met in Group F, so the former Arsenal forward Andrey Arshavin was asked to draw another team.
But United’s ball was not then included in the draw when Arshavin drew Atletico Madrid — despite the Premier League club being a legitimate potential opponent for the Spanish side.
Instead, Liverpool’s ball was included in the pot of Atletico’s potential opponents despite Jurgen Klopp’s side playing the Spanish club in the group stages.
Atletico Madrid were then drawn against Bayern Munich and The Athleticunderstands that the Spanish side were left very frustrated at the errors in the draw, given they were then drawn to play the strongest side in Europe by UEFA’s club coefficient system.
And United were handed something of a nightmare tie against Paris Saint-Germain, which would have seen old foes Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi resume their long-standing personal rivalry.
The rest of the draw proceeded as planned, with Liverpool drawn against RB Salzburg, and Chelsea pitted against Lille. Manchester City will drawn to play the reigning Europa League winners Villarreal.
Elsewhere, Inter Milan were picked out to play Ajax and Sporting Lisbon were due to take on Juventus.
But those ties will now not take place due to the problems in the draw, with the result declared null and void.
As usual the Round of 16 will be played over two legs, with seeded teams at home in the second legs.
The first legs are scheduled for 15/16/22/23 February, with the second legs on 8/9/15/16 March.
