The 1960–61 European Cup was the sixth season of the

European Cup The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competit ...

UEFA Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs fo ...

's premier club

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...

tournament. The competition was won by Benfica, who won 3–2 in the final against

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...

, who had knocked out Spanish rivals

Real Madrid Real Madrid Club de Fútbol (, meaning ''Royal Madrid Football Club''), commonly referred to as Real Madrid, is a Spanish professional football club based in Madrid. Founded in 1902 as Madrid Football Club, the club has traditionally wor ...

, winners of the first five tournaments, in the first round. Benfica was the first Portuguese team to reach the final and to win the tournament. For the first time a Norwegian club participated.

Preliminary round

The draw for the preliminary round took place at

headquarters in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

, France, on 7 July 1960.''

Corriere dello Sport ''Corriere dello Sport'' is an Italian national sports newspaper based in Rome, Italy. It is one of three major Italian sports daily newspapers and has the largest readership in central and southern Italy, the fourth most read throughout the cou ...

, 8 July 1960. As title holders, Real Madrid received a bye, and the remaining 27 teams were grouped geographically into three pots. The first team drawn in each pot also received a bye, while the remaining clubs would play the preliminary round in September. The calendar was decided by the involved teams, with all matches to be played by 30 September.

First leg

---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----

Second leg

''Benfica won 5–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Újpesti Dózsa won 5–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Young Boys won 9–2 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Fredrikstad won 4–3 on aggregate.'' ---- ''AGF won 3–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''CDNA Sofia won 4–3 on aggregate.'' ---- ''IFK Malmö won 5–2 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Rapid Wien won 4–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Stade Reims won 11–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Barcelona won 5–0 on aggregate.''

Bracket

First round

¹ Rapid Wien beat Wismut Karl Marx Stadt 1–0 in a play-off to qualify for the second round.

First leg

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Second leg

''Benfica won 7–4 on aggregate.'' ---- ''AGF won 4–0 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Wismut Karl Marx Stadt 3–3 Rapid Wien on aggregate.'' ''Rapid Wien won 1–0 in a play-off.'' ---- ''IFK Malmö won 2–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Barcelona won 4–3 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Spartak Hradec Králové won 1–0 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Burnley won 4–3 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Hamburg won 8–3 on aggregate.''

Quarter-finals

First leg

---- ---- ----

Second leg

''Benfica won 7–2 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Rapid Wien won 4–0 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Barcelona won 5–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Hamburg won 5–4 on aggregate.''

Semi-finals

¹ Barcelona beat Hamburg 1–0 in a play-off.

First leg

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Second leg

Game abandoned with two minutes to play due to crowd riots and pitch invasion. ''Benfica won 4–1 on aggregate.'' ---- ''Hamburg 2–2 Barcelona on aggregate.'' ''Barcelona won 1–0 in play-off.''

Final

Top scorers

The top scorers from the 1960–61 European Cup (including preliminary round) are as follows:

References

External links

1960–61 All matches – season at UEFA website
* All scorers 1960–61 European Cup (excluding preliminary round) according t
protocols UEFA
– results and line-ups (archive) {{DEFAULTSORT:1960-61 European Cup 1960–61 in European football European Champion Clubs' Cup seasons