2022–23 UEFA Youth League

2022–23 UEFA Youth League

The Stade de Genève in Geneva hosted the semi-finals and final
Tournament details
Dates	6 September 2022 – 24 April 2023
Teams	64 (from 39 associations)
Final positions
Champions	AZ (1st title)
Runners-up	Hajduk Split
Tournament statistics
Matches played	167
Goals scored	575 (3.44 per match)
Attendance	177,367 (1,062 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Bilal Mazhar (Panathinaikos) Mexx Meerdink (AZ) 9 goals each
← 2021–22 2023–24 →

The 2022–23 UEFA Youth League was the ninth season of the UEFA Youth League, a European youth club football competition organised by UEFA.

The title holders were Benfica, who defeated Salzburg 6–0 in the previous season's final. Benfica were eliminated in the group stage, while AZ won their first European title by beating Hajduk Split 5–0 in the final. They became the first Dutch club since Feyenoord in the 2001–02 UEFA Cup to win a European title.

The season saw a sensational campaign by Croatian side Hajduk Split, which managed to knock out sides like Manchester City, Borussia Dortmund and AC Milan to qualify for the final, which took place in Stade de Genève due to the interest by the fans.

A total of 64 teams from 39 of the 55 UEFA member associations entered the tournament. They were split into two sections, each with 32 teams.

• UEFA Champions League Path: The youth teams of the 32 clubs which qualified for the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League group stage entered the UEFA Champions League Path. If there was a vacancy (youth teams not entering), it was filled by a team defined by UEFA.
• Domestic Champions Path: The youth domestic champions of the top 32 associations according to their 2022 UEFA country coefficients entered the Domestic Champions Path. If there was a vacancy (associations with no youth domestic competition, as well as youth domestic champions already included in the UEFA Champions League path), it was first filled by the title holders should they have not yet qualified, and then by the youth domestic champions of the next association in the UEFA ranking.

Apolonia, Ashdod, Borac Banja Luka, Coleraine, Eintracht Frankfurt, Hibernian, Jelgava, Nantes, Omonia, Pobeda, Pyunik, Racing Union, Rukh Lviv, Shamrock Rovers, Trenčín and Zagłębie Lubin made their tournament debuts. Armenia and Northern Ireland were represented for the first time.^[1]

Qualified teams for 2022–23 UEFA Youth League^[1]

Rank	Association	Teams
		UEFA Champions League Path	Domestic Champions Path
1	England	Manchester City[YC] (2021–22 U18 Premier League)[2] Liverpool Chelsea Tottenham Hotspur
2	Spain	Real Madrid Barcelona[YC] (2021–22 División de Honor Juvenil U-19)[3] Atlético Madrid Sevilla
3	Italy	Milan Inter Milan[YC] (2021–22 Campionato Primavera 1)[4] Napoli Juventus
4	Germany	Bayern Munich Borussia Dortmund[YC] (2021–22 A-Junioren-Bundesliga)[5] Bayer Leverkusen RB Leipzig Eintracht Frankfurt
5	France	Paris Saint-Germain Marseille	Nantes (2021–22 Championnat National U19)
6	Portugal	Porto Sporting CP Benfica[TH][PO][YC] (2021–22 Campeonato Nacional Juniores S19)
7	Netherlands	Ajax	AZ (2021–22 Eredivisie U18)
9	Belgium	Club Brugge	Genk (2021–22 Belgian U18 League)
10	Austria	Red Bull Salzburg[YC] (2021–22 Jugendliga U18)[6]
11	Scotland	Celtic Rangers[PO]	Hibernian (2021–22 Scottish U18 League)
12	Ukraine	Shakhtar Donetsk[Note UKR]	Rukh Lviv[Note UKR] (2021–22 Ukrainian Premier League Youth)
13	Turkey		Galatasaray (2021–22 U19 Elite)
14	Denmark	Copenhagen[PO][YC] (2021–22 U19 Ligaen)
15	Cyprus		Omonia (2021–22 Cypriot U19 League)
16	Serbia		Red Star Belgrade (2021–22 Serbian U19 League)
17	Czech Republic	Viktoria Plzeň[PO]	Slavia Prague (2021–22 Czech U19 League)
18	Croatia	Dinamo Zagreb[PO]	Hajduk Split (2021–22 1. HNL Juniori U19)
19	Switzerland		Young Boys (2021–22 Swiss U18 League)
20	Greece		Panathinaikos (2021–22 Superleague K19)
21	Israel	Maccabi Haifa[PO]	Ashdod (2021–22 Israeli U19 Noar Premier League)
22	Norway		Molde (2021 Norwegian U19 Cup)
23	Sweden		AIK (2021 P17 Allsvenskan)
24	Bulgaria		Slavia Sofia (2021–22 U18 BFU Cup)
25	Romania		Csíkszereda Miercurea Ciuc (2021–22 Liga Elitelor U19)
26	Azerbaijan		Gabala (2021–22 Azerbaijani U19 League)
27	Kazakhstan		Astana[Note KAZ] (2021 Kazakhstani U17 League)
28	Hungary		MTK Budapest (2021–22 Hungarian U19 League)
30	Poland		Zagłębie Lubin (2021–22 Polish U18 Central Junior League)
31	Slovenia		Domžale (2021–22 Slovenian U19 League)
32	Slovakia		Trenčín (2021–22 Slovak U19 League)
34	Lithuania		Žalgiris[V-RUS] (2021 Lithuanian Elite Youth League U19 Division)
35	Luxembourg		Racing Union[V-BLR] (2021–22 Luxembourg U19 Junior Championship)
36	Bosnia and Herzegovina		Borac Banja Luka[V-YC] (2021–22 Bosnia and Herzegovina U19 Junior League)
37	Republic of Ireland		Shamrock Rovers[V-YC] (2021 League of Ireland U19 Division)
38	North Macedonia		Pobeda[V-YC] (2021–22 Macedonian U19 League)
39	Armenia		Pyunik[V-YC] (2021 Armenian U18 League)
40	Latvia		Jelgava[V-YC] (2021 Latvian U18 League)
41	Albania		Apolonia[V-PO] (2021–22 Albanian U19 League)
42	Northern Ireland		Coleraine[V-PO] (2021–22 Northern Ireland Academy League U18)

Associations without any participating teams
(no teams qualify for UEFA Champions League group stage, and either with no youth domestic competition or not ranked high enough for a vacancy)

Rank Association 8  Russia[Note RUS] 29  Belarus 33  Liechtenstein 43  Georgia 44  Finland 45  Moldova

Rank Association 46  Malta 47  Faroe Islands 48  Kosovo 49  Gibraltar 50  Montenegro

Rank Association 51  Wales 52  Iceland 53  Estonia 54  Andorra 55  San Marino

Notes

The schedule of the competition was as follows (all draws were held at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, unless stated otherwise).^[9]

• For the UEFA Champions League Path group stage, in principle the teams played their matches on Tuesdays and Wednesdays of the matchdays as scheduled for UEFA Champions League, and on the same day as the corresponding senior teams; however, matches could also be played on other dates, including Mondays and Thursdays.
• For the Domestic Champions Path first and second rounds, in principle matches were played on Wednesdays (first round on matchdays 2 and 3, second round on matchdays 4 and 5, as scheduled for UEFA Champions League); however, matches could also be played on other dates, including Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays.

For the UEFA Champions League Path, the 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four. There was no separate draw held, with the group compositions identical to the draw for the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League group stage, which was held on 25 August 2022, 18:00 CEST (19:00 TRT), in Istanbul, Turkey.^[10]

In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format. The group winners advanced to the round of 16, while the eight runners-up advanced to the play-offs, where they would be joined by the eight second round winners from the Domestic Champions Path.

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		LIV	AJX	RAN	NAP
1	Liverpool	6	5	0	1	20	8	+12	15	Advance to round of 16		—	4–0	4–1	5–0
2	Ajax	6	4	1	1	17	10	+7	13	Advance to play-offs		3–1	—	2–1	5–1
3	Rangers	6	2	0	4	13	20	−7	6			3–4	2–6	—	3–2
4	Napoli	6	0	1	5	7	19	−12	1			1–2	1–1	2–3	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		ATM	POR	BRU	LEV
1	Atlético Madrid	6	5	0	1	14	4	+10	15	Advance to round of 16		—	1–0	1–2	4–0
2	Porto	6	4	0	2	11	7	+4	12	Advance to play-offs		1–2	—	2–1	3–1
3	Club Brugge	6	3	0	3	10	9	+1	9			1–3	1–2	—	4–1
4	Bayer Leverkusen	6	0	0	6	3	18	−15	0			0–3	1–3	0–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		BAR	INT	BAY	PLZ
1	Barcelona	6	4	2	0	18	7	+11	14	Advance to round of 16		—	2–0	3–2	3–0
2	Inter Milan	6	2	1	3	10	14	−4	7	Advance to play-offs		1–6	—	2–2	4–2
3	Bayern Munich	6	1	3	2	13	13	0	6			3–3	2–0	—	1–2
4	Viktoria Plzeň	6	1	2	3	8	15	−7	5			1–1	0–3	3–3	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		SPO	FRA	TOT	MAR
1	Sporting CP	6	4	2	0	13	3	+10	14	Advance to round of 16		—	1–0	2–0	1–1
2	Eintracht Frankfurt	6	3	2	1	9	6	+3	11	Advance to play-offs		1–1	—	1–0	2–0
3	Tottenham Hotspur	6	2	0	4	9	10	−1	6			1–2	2–3	—	3–0
4	Marseille	6	0	2	4	6	18	−12	2			0–6	2–2	2–3	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		MIL	SAL	DZG	CHE
1	Milan	6	4	2	0	12	5	+7	14	Advance to round of 16		—	2–1	3–0	3–1
2	Red Bull Salzburg	6	2	2	2	11	7	+4	8	Advance to play-offs		1–1	—	2–0	5–1
3	Dinamo Zagreb	6	2	0	4	7	14	−7	6			1–2	2–1	—	4–2
4	Chelsea	6	1	2	3	10	14	−4	5			1–1	1–1	4–0	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		RMA	SHK	RBL	CEL
1	Real Madrid	6	5	1	0	23	5	+18	16	Advance to round of 16		—	6–1	1–1	4–1
2	Shakhtar Donetsk	6	3	1	2	6	10	−4	10	Advance to play-offs		0–3	—	0–0	2–1
3	RB Leipzig	6	1	2	3	6	8	−2	5			2–3	0–2	—	1–2
4	Celtic	6	1	0	5	4	16	−12	3			0–6	0–1	0–2	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		MCI	DOR	CPH	SEV
1	Manchester City	6	4	2	0	16	8	+8	14	Advance to round of 16		—	3–2	1–1	1–0
2	Borussia Dortmund	6	2	2	2	9	9	0	8	Advance to play-offs		3–3	—	0–2	2–0
3	Copenhagen	6	2	1	3	9	8	+1	7			1–3	0–1	—	4–1
4	Sevilla	6	1	1	4	5	14	−9	4			1–5	1–1	2–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		PAR	JUV	BEN	MHA
1	Paris Saint-Germain	6	4	1	1	20	11	+9	13	Advance to round of 16		—	5–3	2–3	3–1
2	Juventus	6	3	2	1	17	14	+3	11	Advance to play-offs		4–4	—	1–1	3–1
3	Benfica	6	2	1	3	12	10	+2	7			0–1	2–3	—	0–1
4	Maccabi Haifa	6	1	0	5	6	20	−14	3			0–5	1–3	2–6	—

For the Domestic Champions Path, the 32 teams were drawn into two rounds of two-legged home-and-away ties. The draw for both the first round and second round was held on 31 August 2022.

The eight second round winners advance to the play-offs, where they will join by the eight group runners-up from the UEFA Champions League Path (group stage).

The first legs were played on 12–28 September and the second legs were played on 4–12 October 2022.^[11]

Team 1	Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Red Star Belgrade	3–1[A]	Omonia	1–0	2–1
Young Boys	5–2	Domžale	3–0	2–2
Genk	5–4	Slavia Prague	1–2	4–2
Nantes	5–0	Pyunik	2–0	3–0
AZ	6–1	Shamrock Rovers	5–0	1–1
AIK	8–2	Racing Union	5–0	3–2
Molde	2–2 (4–5 p)	Hibernian	1–0	1–2
Coleraine	5–4[A]	Pobeda	3–2	2–2
MTK Budapest	4–0	Jelgava	3–0	1–0
Žalgiris	2–5	Trenčín	2–1	0–4
Hajduk Split	5–1	Gabala	3–0	2–1
Rukh Lviv	1–0	Zagłębie Lubin	1–0	0–0
Ashdod	5–0	Borac Banja Luka	2–0	3–0
Panathinaikos	10–2[A]	Slavia Sofia	8–0	2–2
Astana	2–4	Apolonia	1–1	1–3
Csíkszereda Miercurea Ciuc	1–5	Galatasaray	1–1	0–4

Notes

Team 1	Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
AZ	3–3 (4–3 p)	Red Star Belgrade	2–2	1–1
Hibernian	3–1	Nantes	1–0	2–1
Young Boys	3–3 (9–8 p)	AIK	0–3	3–0
Coleraine	1–10[A]	Genk	0–4	1–6
Panathinaikos	6–3	Trenčín	2–0	4–3
Apolonia	1–6	Hajduk Split	0–3	1–3
Galatasaray	2–6	Rukh Lviv	1–3	1–3
Ashdod	1–2	MTK Budapest	0–2	1–0

Notes

Play-offs

Round of 16

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Final

8 February

MTK Budapest

0

1 March

Ajax

1

Sporting CP

5

Ajax

1

14 March

Sporting CP

1

8 February

Liverpool

0

Panathinaikos

0

1 March

Porto

1

Liverpool (p)

1 (6)

Porto

1 (5)

21 April – Geneva

Sporting CP

2 (3)

8 February

AZ (p)

2 (4)

AZ

5

1 March

Eintracht Frankfurt

0

Barcelona

0

AZ

3

15 March

AZ

4

7 February

Real Madrid

0

Young Boys

2

1 March

Red Bull Salzburg

3

Real Madrid

3

Red Bull Salzburg

1

24 April – Geneva

AZ

5

7 February

Hajduk Split

0

Hibernian

1

28 February

Borussia Dortmund

2

Borussia Dortmund (p)

1 (5)

Paris Saint-Germain

1 (4)

15 March

Borussia Dortmund

1 (8)

8 February

Hajduk Split (p)

1 (9)

Hajduk Split

1

28 February

Shakhtar Donetsk

0

Hajduk Split

2

Manchester City

1

21 April – Geneva

Hajduk Split

3

8 February

Milan

1

Rukh Lviv (p)

1 (4)

28 February

Inter Milan

1 (3)

Milan

1

Rukh Lviv

0

14 March

Milan

2

8 February

Atlético Madrid

0

Genk (p)

0 (4)

1 March

Juventus

0 (3)

Atlético Madrid

4

Genk

1

The eight second round winners from the Domestic Champions Path were drawn against the eight group runners-up from the UEFA Champions League Path, with the teams from the Domestic Champions Path hosting the match. Teams from the same association could not be drawn against each other.

The draw was conducted on 8 November 2022 at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon.^[9] The play-offs were played over one leg on 7 and 8 February 2023.^[12]

Team 1	Score	Team 2
Young Boys	2–3	Red Bull Salzburg
AZ	5–0	Eintracht Frankfurt
Rukh Lviv	1–1 (4–3 p)	Inter Milan
Hajduk Split	1–0	Shakhtar Donetsk
MTK Budapest	0–1	Ajax
Hibernian	1–2	Borussia Dortmund
Panathinaikos	0–1	Porto
Genk	0–0 (4–3 p)	Juventus

The draw was conducted on 13 February 2023 at 13:00 CET in the UEFA headquarters in Nyon.^[13] The round of 16 was played over one leg on 28 February and 1 March 2023.^[9]

Team 1	Score	Team 2
Milan	1–0	Rukh Lviv
Barcelona	0–3	AZ
Liverpool	1–1 (6–5 p)	Porto
Atlético Madrid	4–1	Genk
Borussia Dortmund	1–1 (5–4 p)	Paris Saint-Germain
Hajduk Split	2–1	Manchester City
Sporting CP	5–1	Ajax
Real Madrid	3–1	Red Bull Salzburg

The draw was conducted on 13 February 2023 at 13:00 CET in the UEFA headquarters in Nyon.^[13] The quarter-finals were played over one leg on 14 and 15 March 2023.^[9]

Team 1	Score	Team 2
AZ	4–0	Real Madrid
Milan	2–0	Atlético Madrid
Sporting CP	1–0	Liverpool
Borussia Dortmund	1–1 (8–9 p)	Hajduk Split

The draw was conducted on 13 February 2023 at 13:00 CET in the UEFA headquarters in Nyon.^[13] The semi-finals were played over one leg on 21 April 2023.^[9] All four teams were qualified to the semi-finals for the first time ever, ensuring a fourth different champions in a row.^[14]

Team 1	Score	Team 2
Sporting CP	2–2 (3–4 p)	AZ
Hajduk Split	3–1	Milan

The final was played on 24 April 2023 at Stade de Genève, Geneva.^[9]

24 April 2023 (2023-04-24)

18:00

AZ	5–0	Hajduk Split
Addai 45' (pen.) Poku 70', 76' Meerdink 79', 87'	Report

Stade de Genève, Geneva

Attendance: 9,390^[15]

Referee: Willy Delajod (France)

Rank[16]	Player	Team	Goals
1	Bilal Mazhar	Panathinaikos	9
	Mexx Meerdink	AZ
3	Ilyes Housni	Paris Saint-Germain	8
	Adrián Niño	Atlético Madrid
	Ernest Poku	AZ
6	Víctor Barberà	Barcelona	7
	Oakley Cannonier	Liverpool
8	Ismaël Gharbi	Paris Saint-Germain	6
	Karim Konaté	Red Bull Salzburg
	Rodrigo Ribeiro	Sporting CP

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