United, Leverkusen eye Europa League glory
MANCHESTER UNITED and BayerLeverkusen have big ambitions when the The Europa League resumes this week with the completion of the last 16 before a mini tournament finale in Germany.
Two of the eight ties tomorrow and Friday, Inter Milan vs Getafe (tomorrow 3am Malaysian time) and Sevilla vs Roma (Fri 12.55am), are played in a single-leg format because the pandemic wiped out their scheduled first meeting.
The Spanish-Italian dates are played in western Germany where the tournament will also conclude Aug 10-21 with a single-leg knockout format culminating in the Cologne final.
Playing at home from the quarterfinals onwards is added motivation for the three Bundesliga clubs left in the tournament, but Eintracht Frankfurt need to overturn a 3-0 deficit at Swiss side Basel and Woilfsburg go to Ukraine 2-1 behind against ex-champions Shakhtar Dontesk.
Only Leverkusen look wellplaced, leading Rangers 3-1 from their win in Scotland some five months ago.
The 2017 champions United should be effectively through taking a 5-0 cushion into their Old Trafford date with Austria’s LASK; Woverhampton Wanderes and Olympiakos are level at 1-1; and Turkish champions Basaksehir take a slender 1-0 lead to Copenhapen.
United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer is expected to rotate his squad, but after a top-four finish in the Premier League they now set the sights on another Europa
League top spot.
“Four games away from winning a trophy. The team has developed all through the season, delighted with finishing third but next step is winning a trophy,” Solskjaer said yesterday.
Leverkusen have also won the event in the past, back in 1988 under the name UEFA Cup, and they finally want a first trophy of any kind since the 1993 German cup – with nine runner-up spots in various events since then.
Star player Kai Havertz is the target of transfer speculation but the cup finalists from last month have already insisted he won’t be going anywhere as long as they are in the competition.
Winning the trophy also their only chance to play in the next Champions League after being pipped for fourth in the
Bundesliga by Borussia Moenchengladbach.
“We will attack in the Europa League,” coach Peter Bosz, who led Ajax into the 2017 final, said yesterday.
The Dutchman believes they have a “realistic” chance to lift the trophy although he also warned that they can’t underestimate Rangers.
Sevilla are record winners of Europe’s second tier event with five titles, including three in a row 2014-2016, and opponents Roma know what they are up against on Thursday in the stadium of German third-tier club MSV Duisburg.
“Against Sevilla it will be hard, but if we play with the same determination we can have our say,” Roma coach Paulo Fonseca said.
The Romans closed the Serie A in fifth with four straight wins, including a 2-1 over champions Juventus.
Inter meanwhile were runnersup to Juve but there is some unrest ahead of tomorrow’s date with Gefate in Gelsenkirchen after coach Antonio Conte lambasted the club for not standing behind him and the squad during the difficult moments of the domestic season.
But they are favoured over Getafe whose veteran centreforward Jorge Molina is under no illusions about the size of the task they face.
“They have a great team. They have one of the strongest squads in Europe. Up front they don’t just have Lautaro (Martinez), the quality they have is brutal,” Milina told Diario AS. – dpa