Seeds of despair in Champions League

I know UEFA want to encourage smaller nations but the last play-off round of the Champions League has some bizarre seeding arrangements. The 20 teams fighting it out for 10 remaining group places have been divided into two pots and then divided into seeds and non-seeds.

On one path you have the seeds Arsenal, Lyon, Sporting, Panathinaikos and Stuttgart with the NON-SEEDS Fiorentina, Celtic, Atletico Madrid, Anderlecht and Timisoara.

On the other you find the SEEDS are Olympiakos, Copenhagen, Levski Sofia, Maccabi Haifa and FC Zurich. The non-seeds are FC Salzburg, Apoel, Ventspils, Debreceni and FC Sheriff.

Spot anything there? The strength difference between the two paths is enormous. I would say the non-seeds in the first section are stronger than the seeded sides in the other. If they wanted to guarantee a few useless teams getting through to get thrashed in the groups they have gone the right way about it.

Bitter Viola fan? You bet.