As football around Europe returns after a long suspension, UEFA is set to announce the format for the latter stages of the Champions League at a key meeting on Wednesday which will also raise the thorny issue of the postponed, pan-continental Euro 2020, reports AFP.
The Champions League was frozen in mid-March before the last-16 stage had been completed, as the sport ground to a halt when the coronavirus pandemic began to take hold.
Initially, European football's governing body had hoped to finish its flagship competition -- along with the Europa League and women's Champions League -- by the end of June.
It soon became clear that such an outcome was overly optimistic, and during the peak of the pandemic in Europe any prospect of finishing the season at all looked slim.
Nevertheless, UEFA has for some time been working on a way of completing its season in August, which looks feasible as leagues restart and the European death toll from Covid-19 slows.
With that in mind, the Executive Committee meeting, to be held by videoconference, is set to approve the idea of a "Final Eight" in Lisbon, as widely reported by media across Europe in recent days.
That would mean finding a way to play out the four remaining last 16, second legs before bringing together all the quarter-finalists in Portugal's capital for a series of one-off games to crown the European champions. According to reports, the final would be on August 23.
