It wasn’t so long ago that Arsenal took Champions League draws for granted. There’s little chance of that now, though.

The Gunners are back in the group stages for the second time in a row after a seven year absence and will be looking do even better than their quarter-final stage exit last season. After sailing through the group stages Mikel Arteta’s men edged past Porto on penalties in the round of 16 before narrowly losing out to familiar foes Bayern Munich in the last eight.

This time around things will be different. First and foremost that’s because the competition itself is going to be different.

The eight groups of four are gone and have been replaced by a 36-team league phase to start the competition. Arsenal will play eight matches in this league against eight different teams, split evenly between home and away games.

Arsenal’s potential opponents will come from the typical seeded pots, which now contain nine teams each rather than the previous eight. The Gunners will face two teams from each pot in the league phase.

If Arsenal finish in the top eight of the league they will progress automatically to the round of 16. The teams ranked from nine to 24 will then face off against each other in a two-legged playoff to determine the next eight sides to advance to the knockout phases. The ninth placed team facing the 24th, the 10th-placed team facing the 23rd and so on.

With such a complicated new set up, it’s vital that Arsenal get a good draw in the group stages. They have been ranked in pot 2 due to their UEFA coefficient, though. This means they find themselves something of a hostage to fortune.

The Gunners can not play other English teams, meaning they won’t face Manchester City, Liverpool or Aston Villa in the league phase. And they cannot face more than one team from each nation. So the clubs they could face in each pot are as follows –

Pot 1: Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, Inter Milan, Borussia Dortmund, RB Leipzig, Barcelona.

Pot 2: Bayer Leverkusen, Atletico Madrid, Atalanta, Juventus, Benfica, Club Brugge, Shakhtar Donetsk, AC Milan.

Pot 3: Feyenoord, Sporting Lisbon, PSV Eindhoven, Red Bull Salzburg, Young Boys, Celtic, Dinamo Zagreb, Lille, Red Star Belgrade.

Pot 4: Monaco, Sparta Prague, Bologna, Girona, Stuttgart, Sturm Graz, Brest, Slovan Bratislava.

In an ideal world Arsenal would probably want to draw Borussia Dortmund from pot 1. The Germans may have reached the Champions League final last season, but they finished fifth in the Bundesliga and have also lost Niclas Fullkrug to West Ham, while club talisman Marco Reus has moved to the MLS. The second team that Arsenal might hope for would probably be Barcelona. The Gunners have had some thrilling and heartbreaking clashes with the Catalan giants in recent years, but this is a very different Barca side. La Blaugrana are still struggling to register players and could be a nice statement win for Arteta’s men.

Alternatively the Gunners will want to avoid Real Madrid. The Spanish and European champions have gone up a level by adding Kylian Mbappe to their ranks and will strike fear into the hearts of any opponents they face. Arsenal will probably fancy their chance against most other teams in pot one, but after losing out to Bayern Munich last year, they may want to avoid Harry Kane if possible.

In pot two things start to look a little more friendly. Shakhtar Donetsk are a unique case given everything going on around the Ukrainian club right now, but Arsenal would be pretty happy to draw them. A tie against Belgian champions Club Brugge wouldn’t be too bad either.

A team to avoid is definitely Atletico Madrid. Diego Simeone’s style is Kryptonite to the kind of attractive football Arteta wants to play. Arsenal may have hammered Bayer Leverkusen in pre-season, but they’ll probably want to avoid them too.

In pot three Sporting Lisbon are a side Arsenal have come up a cropper against in recent times. They’ll want to avoid them if they can. Young Boys and their artificial pitch at the Wankdorf Stadium will also be something the Gunners are keen to avoid.

Arsenal would probably be quite happy with another trip to Eindhoven to play PSV. Admittedly Arsenal haven’t won in visits in either of their past two seasons, but it’s been near the end of both group stages. They’ll be happy to get the chance to avenge that. Equally a match up with Celtic would reduce travel and be a potentially winnable fixture.

In pot four, French surprise package Brest would be a side Arsenal could be happy to draw. Having lost to the Ligue 1 over-achievers Lens last season though it may not be all plain sailing. A reunion with Mika Biereth at Sturm Graz could be positive too.

A side they’ll probably want to avoid are Girona. The Spaniards shocked everyone in La Liga last season to secure a Champions League finish. They have many promising players from the City Football Group and could be a banana skin. Also a tie against French heavyweights Monaco has the potential to be tough.