Champions League final round set

So we have the final teams in the Champions League:

Group Winners:
Chelsea
Bayern
Liverpool
Valencia
Lyon
Manchester United
Arsenal
Milan

Group Runner Ups:
Barca
Inter
PSV
Roma
Real Madrid
Celtic
Porto
Lille

Due to the long list of rules stating how teams can match up for the knock out stage, here are matches up I would love to see:

Chelsea - Porto :Mourinho's old team vs new team, wonder how the "special one" will be received back in Portugal
Bayern - PSV :always fun to have a Germany-Holland match up, cannot wait to see the bright orange army helmets in the stands.
Liverpool - Inter :same match up as the Champions League finals from Istanbul, well at least from a city point of view(Liverpool vs Milan)....Inter rather than AC Milan
Valencia - Lille : Can Lille keep the Cinderella run alive against Spains lesser known footballing power.
Lyon - Roma: Match up out of necessity or else the rest of my list cannot work.....
Manchester United - Real Madrid: Clash of two of the world's best known clubs
Arsenal - Barca: Rematch of last years finals
Milan - Celtic: Rematch of the 1966-7 finals....well again with regards to the same city. In that finals Celtic beat Internazionale of Milan 2-1.

Okay enough of a pie in the sky idea. Here are the teams I see as favorites:

Manchester United: Pains me to ever say that the Red Devils are favorites. But they showed that they have the fire power and team to win the big games. The Saha - Rooney tandem up front with Ronaldo and Giggs supporting seems to be a winning combo. They demonstrated against Benefica that they could come back after being down to win a must win game.

Chelsea: How can you not include a team that has international caliber players sitting on the their bench? I think that Morinho's men will find a way to choke away the championship, but they cruised through what was thought be to be the hardest qualifying group. Drogba is unstoppable, Essein and Makelele create a formidable holding midfield. Their weak link is the keeper, with Cech out and Cudacini questionable this might prove their down fall.

Bayern: While the Bavarian club is struggling in their domestic league, they have the right mix for Europe. They can play defense with Sagnol, Van Buyten and Lahm. Their goalkeeping, while long in the tooth is solid with Kahn. The midfield and attack have the talent to carry them deep - Makaay, Podoloski up front, van Bommel, Schweinsteiger in the midfield.

Lyon: The French Champions are once again poised to make a run...they have talent through out the entire squad. Additionally they have made 1/4 final runs the past two seasons, question is can they take the next step. This could be the year, especially when Fred returns.

Inter Milan: They collected a number of players after Juventus got slapped for their match fixing...adding Vieira and Ibrahimovic, in addition to WC hero Grosso, bolstered an already strong squad. And Crespo is clicking in the domestic league, he should be able to carry this success over to Europe.

Of course no one will know what or who would be favorite until we see the actually match ups for the knock out rounds. If I was to predict the finals, I will say Chelsea vs Lyon....Lyon wins on a last minute goal by Tiago after Essien loses a 50 - 50 ball at midfield.....one can always dream.

On another topic, many cries about the dominance of the "big three" leagues - Serie A, Premiership and La Ligua, 11 of the final 18 teams are from these leagues. There are cries to do something to give clubs from other leagues the chance to get into the final 18. I think the argument to limit leagues to sending only 3 clubs has some merit, if we look historically the Champions League winner (or the old Cup of Champions) comes from these very leagues. 31 of the total 51 winners have come from Spain, Italy or England. Real Madrid alone has 9 titles.

The main issue is these domestic leagues contain some of the European football powers - Real Madrid, Barcalona, Manchester United, Liverpool, Milan, and Juventus. These are the clubs that have the history, the system and ability to attract the talent and money needed to compete at the highest level. "Smaller" clubs such as Porto or Dortmund will sneak in and win a Champions title every so often. But unless we completely overhaul the football system, payment structure and player movement the top clubs in the Big Three leagues will always challenge for the title. As much as we would like to see the CSKA Moscow, Galatassary, or Hertha Berlins of the world getting into the knock out stages and get to the semi finals, I doubt we will see such a revolution in European Football until we have a massive change.

Until then the complaining that the Champions League is an exclusive club for the "Big Three Leagues" will remain the status quo.