Last time we were in the fourth pot of seeds when the draw was made meaning that we had no chance of getting any of the minnows who had made the league stages of the competition.
But our performance last season should see us in the third pot of seeds, which will still mean two top teams are in the group but also one of the ‘lesser’ sides.
Manchester United are unsurprisingly listed as amongst the top seeds, as strangely are Arsenal.
But the really mystifying ranking is Chelsea who it is claimed will be seeded above us, despite the fact that their Cup Winners’ Cup victory was five seasons ago and in the last three years they have gone out of Europe to St Gallen, Hapoel Tel Aviv and Viking Stavanger.
Likely Champions League seedings for 2003/04
Pot one: AC Milan, Real Madrid, Manchester United, Bayern Munich, Lazio, Arsenal, Juventus, one other.
Pot two: Inter, FC Porto, Galatasaray, Lyons, Panathinaikos, B Dortmund, Chelsea, one other.
Pot three: Celtic, Olympic Pireaus, AEK Athens, Newcastle, Rangers, three others.
Pot four: VfB Stuttgart, Loko Moscow, Anderlecht, AS Monaco, Besiktas, three others.