2013/2014 Europa League

The third round of qualifying is this evening and some of the bigger clubs will be entering the competition. There's also clubs from Luxembourg, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Albania, who you wouldn't expect to get this far into the competition.

The fixtures tonight are:

Trencin (Slovakia) vs Astra (ROM)
Petrolul (ROM) vs Vitesse (NED)
Ventspils (LAT) vs Maccabi Haifa (ISR)
Dinamo Minsk (BEL) vs Trabzonspor (TUR)
Aktobe (KAZ) vs Breidablik (ICE)
Jablonec (Czech) vs Stromsgodset (NOR)
Qarabag (AZE) vs Gefle (SWE)
FC Minsk (BEL) vs St. Johnstone (SCO)
Choronomorets (UKR) vs Crvena (SER)
Randers (DEN) vs Rubin (RUS)
Zalgiris (LIT) vs Lech (POL)
Tromso (NOR) vs Differdange (LUX)
Hacken (SWE) vs Thun (SWI)
Rijeka (CRO) vs Zilina (Slovakia)
Botiv Plodev (BUL) vs Stuttgart (GER)
Kukesi (ALB) vs Metalurh Donetsk (UKR)
Pandurii (ROM) vs Hapoel Tel-Aviv (ISR)
Vojvodina (SER) vs Bursapor (TUR)
Liberec (Czech) vs Zurich (SWI)
Xanthi (GRE) vs Standard Liege (BEL)
St. Etienne (FRA) vs Milsami (MOL)
Asteras (GRE) vs Rapid Wien (AUS)
Swansea (ENG) vs Malmo (SWE)
Siroki Brljeg (BOS) vs Udinese (ITA)
Slask (POL) vs Club Brugge (BEL)
Motherwell (SCO) vs Kuban (RUS)
Hajduk Split (CRO) vs Dila (GEO)
Estoril (POR) vs Ramat Gan (ISR)
Sevilla (ESP) vs Mladost (MON)

The second leg is on the 8th of August.

The winners of those ties and the 15 losers from the third Champions League qualifying round will join these teams, who are already in the play-off round:

Tottenham (ENG)
Real Betis (ESP)
Frankfurt (GER)
Fiorentina (ITA)
Braga (POR)
Nice (FRA)
Spartak Moscow (RUS)
AZ (NED)
Feyenoord (NED)
Dynamo Kyiv (UKR)
Dnipro (UKR)
Atromitos (GRE)
Besiktas (TUR)
Genk (BEL)
Esbjerg (DEN)
St. Gallen (SWI)
Pasching (AUS)
Apollon (CYP)

These teams are already in the group stages:

Wigan (ENG)
Valencia (ESP)
Freiburg (GER)
Lazio (ITA)
Vitoria (POR)
Bordeaux (FRA)
Anzhi (RUS)

swansea vs malmo is going to be a great game. in the end swansea will probably win comfortably but malmo are a very good side

halamadrid2 wrote:swansea vs malmo is going to be a great game. in the end swansea will probably win comfortably but malmo are a very good side

Second that, also Swansea have had a great pre-season, I think I read their Goals Scored - Conceded was something like 28 - 1, this is their first competitive game of the season and I for one am much interested in their success this season. They've kept Michu - and all their good players, really - and have signed Bony, the Liverpool legend Shelvey, Amat, Canas... After they had won the League Cup last season they completely lost interest and lost a host of matches, so one can't be all that sure that they're going to hit the ground running, but from an objective point of view they are one of the most intriguing teams to follow this season and it's against Malmo where it starts.

Woah, maybe I could have done with a little fewer words there in my praise for Swansea's exciting squad (and manager), but waddehell.

Europa League legend Shelvinho to obviously win the game all by himself.

Swansea will be great to watch, will possibly be the only team ever from the EPL (except Liverpool) that I will support in Europe.

Quite an achievement.

Suarez99 wrote:Swansea will be great to watch, will possibly be the only team ever from the EPL (except Liverpool) that I will support in Europe.

Quite an achievement.

You just said that you might support a Welsh team from the English Premier League...
It's Barclay's Premier League (BPL), pls, 10% of the clubs there are not English but Welsh, pls

Swansea team to play Malmo:

Vorm; Rangel, Amat, Williams, Davies: Britton, Shelvey; Routledge, Michu, Dyer; Bony

Game's about to kick off.

Just watched the first half and the Swans were pretty good. Well in control. It's 1 - 0 at HT, but their goal was a fluke, a Malmo defender slipping up and letting Michu through. The Liverpool legend that is Shelvey looked good, very composed in the middle of the park with calm dsitribution.

Swansea get in, wanted to go to Malmø to see them, but don't know about now since it's pretty much done.

Some of the more noteworthy results tonight:

FC Minsk 0 - 1 St. Johnstone (McLean)
Botev Plodiv 1 - 1 Stuttgart (Domovchyski; Ibisevic)
St. Etienne 3 - 0 Milsami (Brandao x2, Cohade)
Swansea 4 - 0 Malmo (Michu, Bony x2, Pozuelo)
Siroki Brijeg 1 - 3 Udinese (Coric; Di Natale, Muriel x2)
Sevilla 3 - 0 Mladost (Bacca, Perotti pen, Carrico)

Stuttgart drawing with Plovdiv  
Their defense was officially atrocious. Plovdiv could have won 3:1 or 4:1...

rwo power wrote:Stuttgart drawing with Plovdiv  
Their defense was officially atrocious. Plovdiv could have won 3:1 or 4:1...

Bundesliga to lose 4th CL spot soon

In all seriousness though i can actually see EL performances of some BL teams dropping because they themselves would fancy a chance of making the top 4.Werent Freiburg for example on the verge of making top 4 last year ? The disparity between CL and EL(in terms of money) is enormous so i can actually see that happening.

Well, on the other hand you have to consider that it is still pre-season, and obviously teams like Plovdiv who are already two weeks in the season have a slight advantage due to that. As for teams trying to play for the 4th place trophy - dunno. I guess we'll have to see how things develop.

Well the mentality seems to have already set in among some BL teams.Just look at last season's EL.No BL team in the last 8 and just 1 BL team in last 16 which is a shock considering how impressive they've been in this competition

Hm. Stuttgart last season was abysmal both in league and EL, so you can't really say they abandoned the EL for the Bundesliga. (They only qualified for this year via reaching the DFB-Pokal final as they ended up 12th in the BL). And Hannover didn't really rip out trees in the BL last season either.

For BMG it was their first European run after quite some years, so you could claim their utter inexperience in European competitions as source for their failure. Mind you, Dortmund unceremoniously crashed out of the EL in 2010/11, too, when Kloppo first had to get used to playing international.

As for Bayer Leverkusen... Well, they are notorious for underachieving on all fronts - so I don't really think they played bad on purpose - they just had one of their usual collapses. Their moniker "Neverkusen" doesn't come out of the blue after all.

I fear that SC Freiburg will have it very difficult this season, too - they lost many of their key players of the last season to bigger clubs and they are just in the process of rebuilding their squad with fresh kids.

And Eintracht Frankfurt is very much a newbie in Europe, too (heck, last season they were just promoted from the 2. division to the BL!).

The BL again suffers from the fact that we don't really have a consistent set of clubs that enter the EL - so all the newbies first have to get used to the competition, and this can easily mean that they will suffer badly.

Surag wrote:Bundesliga to lose 4th CL spot soon

Good joke. Who will overtake Germany? Portugal?


Nice goal by Plaku yesterday.

So, Stuttgart have just kicked off in Großaspach against Plovdiv, where they have to build on a 1:1 they got in Bulgaria to proceed to the next stage.

Sevilla leading Mladost 2-0 after 30 minutes with Victor Manchin and Rusescu scoring their first goals for the club. 5-0 on aggregate. Safe to say this tie is done.

Udinese are leading Siroki Brijeg 1-0 thanks to a goal from Di Natale.

It's currently Malmo 0 - 0 Swansea.

St. Etienne won 3-0 earlier. They're through to the next round.

Club Brugge vs Slask Wroclaw the best two-legged tie in this round.

Stuttgart  

Teams in the play-off draw tomorrow (seeded teams in bold):

Qualified via League
Tottenham (ENG), Real Betis (ESP), Frankfurt (GER), Fiorentina (ITA), Braga (POR), Nice (FRA), Spartak Moscow (RUS), AZ (NED), Feyenoord (NED), Dynamo Kyiv (UKR), Dnipro (UKR), Atromitos (GRE), Besiktas (TUR), Genk (BEL), Esbjerg (DEN), St. Gallen (SWI), Pasching (AUS), Apollon (CYP)

Winners of the 3rd Qualifying Round
Rijeka (CRO), Rubin (RUS), Dila (GEO), Astra (ROM), Kukesi (ALB), M. Haifa (ISR), Pandurii (ROM), Zalgiris (LIT), Estoril (POR), Qarabag (AZE), Kuban (RUS), St. Etienne (FRA), Vojvodina (SER), Liberec (Czech), Tromso (NOR), Thun (SWI), Swansea (ENG), Petrolul (ROM), Trabzonspor (TUR), Stuttgart (GER), Standard Liege (BEL), Rapid Wein (AUS), Sevilla (ESP), Chornomorets (UKR), Udinese (ITA), Slask (POL), St. Johnstone (SCO)/Minsk (BEL), Breidabilk (ICE)/Aktobe (KAZ)

Dropping down from the Champions League
M. Tel Aviv (ISR), Dinamo Tbilisi (GEO), APOEL (CYP), Skenderbeu (ALB), Salzburg (AUS), Partizan (SER), Grasshoppers (SWI), FH (ICE), Nordsjaellend (DEN), PAOK (GRE), Sheriff (MOL), Elfsborg (SWE), Kalju (EST), Molde (NOR), Zulte Waregem (BEL)

Stuttgart were abysmal and can thank Sven Ulreich that he kept his goal clean after all. They proceeded with a disappointing 0:0 to the play-offs, but if they don't improve considerably till then, it will be their final destination.

ProXima wrote:Club Brugge vs Slask Wroclaw the best two-legged tie in this round.

Exactly!

What a matches.

Some of the stand out ties in the play-off round:

Kuban Krasnodar vs Feyenoord
Tromso vs Besiktas
Swansea vs Petrolul
Atromitos vs AZ Alkmaar
Slask Wroclaw vs Sevilla
Qarabag vs Frankfurt
Jablonec vs Real Betis
Rijeka vs Stuttgart
Esbjerg vs St. Etienne
Grasshopper Zurich vs Fiorentina
Udinese vs Slovan Liberec
Dinamo Tbilisi vs Tottenham

The first legs are on the 22nd of August.

Chelsea will win it again beating Real Madrid in the Final

Qarabag vs Eintracht Frankfurt is life on German Free-TV HR (Hessischer Rundfunk).

Official stream: http://www.hr-online.de/website/rubriken/sport/index.jsp (probably needs a German proxy)

06.) 0:1 - Alexander Meier (assist by Stefano Celozzi)

HT - Qarabag 0:1 Eintracht Frankfurt