The draw was held on 28 August 2015, 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 2015
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 (e.g.,
Sporting CP and
Belenenses,
Fenerbahçe and
Beşiktaş) 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., Belarus, 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 club
Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk (Pot 1) and Russian clubs
Rubin Kazan (Pot 1),
Lokomotiv Moscow and
Krasnodar (both Pot 3) could not be drawn into the same group. ==Teams==