2016–17 UEFA Europa League group stage

The 2016–17 UEFA Europa League group stage began on 15 September and ended on 9 December 2016. A total of 48 teams compete in the group stage to decide 24 of the 32 places in the knockout phase of the 2016–17 UEFA Europa League.

The draw was held on 26 August 2016, 13:00 CEST, at the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco. The 48 teams were drawn into twelve groups of four, with the restriction that teams from the same association could not be drawn against each other. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots based on their 2016 UEFA club coefficients.

Moreover, the draw was controlled for teams from the same association in order to split the teams evenly into the two sets of groups (A–F, G–L) for maximum television coverage.

The fixtures were decided after the draw. On each matchday, six groups play their matches at 19:00 CEST/CET, while the other six groups play their matches at 21:05 CEST/CET, with the two sets of groups (A–F, G–L) alternating between each matchday. There are other restrictions: for example, teams from the same city in general do not play at home on the same matchday (UEFA tries to avoid teams from the same city playing at home on the same day, due to logistics and crowd control), and teams in certain countries (e.g. Russia) do not play at home on the last matchday (due to cold weather and simultaneous kick-off times).

On 17 July 2014, the UEFA emergency panel ruled that Ukrainian and Russian clubs would not be drawn against each other "until further notice" due to the political unrest between the countries. Therefore, Ukrainian clubs Shakhtar Donetsk (Pot 1) and Zorya Luhansk (Pot 4) and Russian clubs Zenit Saint Petersburg (Pot 1) and Krasnodar (Pot 3) could not be drawn into the same group.

Below are the participating teams (with their 2016 UEFA club coefficients), grouped by their seeding pot. They include 16 teams which enter in this stage, the 22 winners of the play-off round, and the 10 losers of the Champions League play-off round.

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