Uefa hand Tottenham seeding boost

Tottenham may be bottom of the Barclays Premier League but they find themselves among the top-rated teams for tomorrow's Uefa Cup group stage draw.

The north Londoners are in Pot 1 alongside six-times European champions AC Milan, 2006 and 2007 Uefa Cup winners Sevilla, 2004 winners Valencia and 2005 champions CSKA Moscow.

Portuguese giants Benfica, German side Schalke - Uefa Cup winners in 1997 - and Hamburg round off the top pool.

Manchester City are in Pot 3 alongside Rosenborg, Udinese, Feyenoord, Braga, Slavia Prague, Galatasaray and Sampdoria, while Portsmouth and Aston Villa are in the fourth pot with Hertha Berlin, Partizan Belgrade, Nancy, Racing Santander, FC Copenhagen and Dinamo Zagreb.

Standard Liege, who dropped into the Uefa Cup after losing to Liverpool in the Champions League qualifiers, are in the fifth pot despite knocking Everton out of the competition in the first round last week.

Uefa have stated that teams from the same country will not be drawn together into the same group.

There will be eight groups of five teams, with each team playing two home games and two away games. The top three teams from each group progress to the knockout stage, where they are joined by the eight teams finishing third in the Champions League group phase to make up the last 32.

Matches will be played on 23 October, 6 November, 27 November, 3 and 4 December and 17 and 18 December.