November 3, 2022 - Dinamo needed a miracle to continue playing in Europe this season, but a loss against Chelsea on Wednesday night in London resulted in a last-place finish in their Champions League group.
Chelsea beat Dinamo 2-1 in the 6th round of Group E of the Champions League, thus eliminating the Zagreb team from playing in Europe this season.
Dinamo could have finished 3rd in the standings and continued in the Europa League only by beating Chelsea and if Milan beat RB Salzburg. Milan did beat the Austrian champion 4-0 at home, but Dinamo could not do the same at Stamford Bridge.
Bruno Petković put Dinamo in the lead in the seventh minute, but Chelsea turned the score around by the end of the first half. Raheem Sterling scored in the 18th minute and Denis Zakaria in the 30th.
Dinamo thus finished the competition with one win, one draw, and four losses.
Chelsea finished first in Group E and Milan in second, advancing to the Champions League round of 16. RB Salzburg will continue playing in the Europa League.
The Croatian champion secured huge earnings this European season, reports Index.hr. Entry into the Champions League group stage brought Dinamo a minimum of 15.64 million euros, and another 2.8 million was received after beating Chelsea at the start of the competition. Furthermore, a draw in the fourth round against Salzburg brought Dinamo another 930,000 euros.
But that's not all. Each participant in the Champions League will receive a share of 600.6 million euros, which UEFA will distribute based on the club's coefficient in the last ten years. This amount will be divided into "coefficient shares," and each share is worth 1,137 million euros.
The best-ranked club in the Champions League will receive 32 of these shares, and according to the club coefficient, the lowest-ranked club will receive one share. There, Dinamo will receive 6.28 million euros.
Money from the marketing pool also goes into this. UEFA has secured an additional 300.3 million euros for Champions League participants, which will be distributed by the proportional value of the market in each club's country. When everything is added up, Dinamo will earn more than 25 million euros in the Champions League this season.
Champions League Round of 16
Group winners: Bayern Munich, Benfica, Chelsea, FC Porto, Manchester City, Napoli, Real Madrid, Tottenham Hotspur
Group runners-up: AC Milan, Borussia Dortmund, Club Brugge, Eintracht Frankfurt, Inter Milan, Liverpool, Paris Saint-Germain, RB Leipzig
Drops into Europa League: Ajax, Barcelona, Bayer Leverkusen, FC Salzburg, Juventus, Sevilla, Shakhtar Donetsk, Sporting CP
Eliminated from Europe: Atletico Madrid, Celtic, FC Copenhagen, Dinamo Zagreb, Maccabi Haifa, Marseille. Rangers, Viktoria Plzen
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