The draw was held on 25 June 2015, 13:30 CEST, at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland. The 32 teams were allocated into four seeding positions based on their UEFA club coefficientsat the beginning of the season. They were drawn into eight groups of four containing one team from each of the four seeding positions. First, the eight teams which were pre-selected as hosts were drawn from their own designated pot and allocated to their respective group as per their seeding positions. Next, the remaining 24 teams were drawn from their respective pot which were allocated according to their seeding positions. Below are the 32 teams which participated in the qualifying round, with the eight teams which were pre-selected as hosts marked by .
In each group, teams played against each other in a round-robin mini-tournament at the pre-selected hosts. The eight group winners advanced to the round of 32 to join the 24 teams which qualified directly.
Tiebreakers
The teams were ranked according to points. If two or more teams were equal on points on completion of the group matches, the following criteria were applied in the order given to determine the rankings :
higher number of points obtained in the group matches played among the teams in question;
superior goal difference from the group matches played among the teams in question;
higher number of goals scored in the group matches played among the teams in question;
if, after having applied criteria 1 to 3, teams still had an equal ranking, criteria 1 to 3 were reapplied exclusively to the matches between the teams in question to determine their final rankings. If this procedure did not lead to a decision, criteria 5 to 9 applied;
higher number of goals scored in all group matches;
if only two teams had the same number of points, and they were tied according to criteria 1 to 6 after having met in the last round of the group, their rankings were determined by a penalty shoot-out.
lower disciplinary points total based only on yellow and red cards received in all group matches ;
