The quarter-finals in the Europa League has everything to offer. With AS Roma and FC Sevilla, champions of the past years are there, with Union St Gilloise a European newcomer and two of the biggest names in club football, Juventus and Manchester. Germany is also represented with Bayer 04 Leverkusen. The games on Thursday (04/13/2023) at a glance.
Feyenoord vs AS Roma (6.45 p.m.)
The Dutch missed a big chance about a week ago. Last Wednesday (April 5th, 2023) Feyenoord lost in the semi-finals of the domestic cup competition against Ajax Amsterdam (1: 2) and thus missed the chance of the treble. Because Rotterdam is playing its best season in a long time. In the league, the club is eight points ahead of the competition with six games to go and is about to win its first title in six years – and things are going very well in the Europa League, having reached the quarter-finals.
There it comes to a new edition of the final of last season in the Conference League. In the debut of this competition, Feyenoord met AS Roma, suffering an unfortunate 1-0 defeat to a Nicolo Zaniolo goal.
The good news for Rotterdam: Zaniolo (now at Galatasaray Istanbul) is no longer there. The bad news: The Roma can be rated as even better than almost a year ago. Last weekend, coach José Mourinho’s side managed to move up to third place in Serie A with a 1-0 win at Torino, ahead of Milan clubs Inter and AC, who are in the quarter-finals of the Champions League , but now have to fight for qualification with Rome.
However, Mourinho warns that his team may not be ready to succeed in both LaLiga and Europa League. “We have to think like a big team and a big team doesn’t sacrifice competition.”
Bayer Leverkusen vs. Union St. Gilloise (9 p.m.)
The fact that the “Werkself” is still in the Europa League at all was very fortunate. Atletico Madrid lost at FC Porto on the last day of the Champions League preliminary round and ensured that Leverkusen’s 0-0 draw against FC Bruges was enough to finish third in Group B and thus spend the winter in the Europa League.
A lot has changed at Bayer since then. Xabi Alonso managed to get the team back on track. And with Florian Wirtz, the key player is back in top form. With the national player in the starting XI, Leverkusen have won nine of eleven competitive games this season. If he wasn’t there from the start, there were only eight wins in 27 games.
The performance of St. Gilloise (first time in the European Cup) against Union Berlin shows that the next task in the Europa League is not known by name, but is very difficult from a sporting point of view. The Belgians disenchanted the third in the Bundesliga, in the second leg the “iron” had no chance at 0:3.
“With Saint-Gilloise, a top team from Belgium is waiting for us. They impressively demonstrated their qualities in the games against Union Berlin“Said sporting director Simon Rolfes. “But we will do everything to get into the semi-finals.” It would be the first time in Europe for Leverkusen since losing the Champions League final in 2002 against Real Madrid (1-2).
Manchester United vs Sevilla FC (9 p.m.)
Of the eight quarter-finalists, there are two clubs who have already managed to win the Europa League title (since 2009/10) – and these clubs meet in the Manchester v Sevilla game. The Spaniards are the undisputed record winners in this competition, having already won four times, United was the champion in 2017.
Three years ago there was this game in the semi-finals of the Europa League – and Manchester wants to take revenge for the bankruptcy at the time against the later cup winners. “It’s going to be tough. Now we’re playing against a really experienced side who have won the cup three times in the last eight years. We have to be ready and play our best football to beat them“said United coach Erik ten Hag.
He has proven to be an absolute Spain specialist this season. In the group stage, opponents included Real Sociedad (1 win, 1 loss), in the second round Manchester eliminated FC Barcelona (agg 4:3) and in the round of 16 there were two wins against Betis Sevilla. However, United are still concerned about the use of Marcus Rashford, who has been in excellent form for months.
However, Sevilla are under more pressure in the duel. The season in the league is a disaster, as 13th the club still have to collect points to avoid relegation and a few weeks ago sacked coach Jorge Sampaoli after only five months in office. Under his successor José Luis Mendilibar there were at least four points from two games.
Juventus vs Sporting Lisbon (9pm)
For Juve, too, the Europa League is a nice distraction from the disappointments the club is experiencing in Serie A at home. Because of the 15-point deduction for accounting fraud, Turin threatens to miss out on European business entirely and last weekend at 1: 2 at Lazio Rome they didn’t use a great opportunity to get very close to the competition. The last way to the Champions League could therefore be victory in the Europa League.
And that’s exactly what Juventus has set out to do. “We have the quality to win the Europa League and that’s our goal“said Filip Kostic, who won the trophy with Eintracht Frankfurt last year.
With Sporting Lisbon, however, an extremely high hurdle awaits. The Portuguese switched surprisingly in the round of 16 Premier League-Leaders Arsenal FC out in a penalty shootout. So Sporting showed that they can hold their own against top teams and perform at their best when it matters most. So it is quite possible that Turin will get the next blow this season.