Europa League, Bologna and Roma’s possible crossovers in the knockout stage
With Thursday’s eighteen matches having concluded the Europa League maxi round, Europe’s second competition is preparing to experience the draw of the playoff pairings involving the teams ranked between ninth and 24th place, among which there’s also an Italian, Bologna. The draw will be made on Friday, Jan. 30, after the Champions League ones, and will naturally also affect Roma, whose draw with Panathinaikos ensured their direct passage to the round of 16.
The Italian team will be involved in the playoffs.
Bologna, who finished tenth, will be seeded and will face, as per the rules, one of the two teams placed in the last two available places, namely Dinamo Zagreb and Brann. The one not paired with the Felsinians will instead face Genk, who qualified in ninth place. In the next round, the winners of the two pairings will face either seventh or eighth, namely Freiburg or Roma. It cannot be ruled out, therefore, that Bologna and Roma could face each other right at the level of the round of 16.
The other teams already qualified for the round of 16 (in addition to the Germans and the Giallorossi) are Lyon, Aston Villa, Midtjylland, Betis, Porto and Braga, while in addition to Bologna, Genk, Dinamo Zagreb and Brann, Stuttgart, Ferencvaros, Nottingham Forest, Viktoria Plzen, Red Star, Celta Vigo, Paok, Lille, Fenerbahce, Panathinaikos, Celtic and Ludogorets have also gained a pass to the play-offs. That leaves twenty-four teams aspiring to pick up the legacy of Tottenham, winner of last year’s Europa League.
Roma’s Europa League journey so far has been up and down but still effective: 2-1 success at home to Nice on the first day, defeats at the Stadio Olimpico 1-0 to Lille and 2-1 to Viktoria Plzen, successes in Scotland against Rangers 2-0 and against Celtic 3-0, interspersed with a home win against Midtjylland 2-1, before the 2-0 win at Stuttgart and the 1-1 draw against Panathinaikos that earned eighth place.
Bologna, on the other hand, started by losing 1-0 at home to Aston Villa and drawing 1-1 at the Dall’Ara against Freiburg, before beating FCSB 2-1 away, drawing 0-0 at home with Brann, overcoming Salzburg 4-1 always in front of a friendly crowd, conquering Vigo by beating Celta 2-1, drawing 2-2 with Celtic at home and winning on the neutral in Backa Topola against Maccabi Tel Aviv 3-0.
