Astra Giurgiu’s qualification here was quite the miracle!Dragonite wrote:Prediction
1. Roma
2. Viktoria Plzen
3. Austria Wien
4. Astra Giurgiu
They started with a 2-3 home defeat against the weakest opponent Austria Wien and they seemed doomed right there. Losing the following match 0-4 in Italy against Roma hasn’t exactly improved their already tiny chances.
But then with a win in Czech Republic against Viktoria Plzen they entered the fight. It’s extremely rare that a team with 0 points after two matches is still capable of recovering to advance from a group, but Astra Giurgiu not only did it, they could have even done it with fewer points than the ones they got (Austria Wien’s defeat in Czech Republic made Astra Giurgiu’s home point against Roma irrelevant for qualifying purposes, they would have qualified even with a defeat).
Even the way that they won in Austria was strange, they were losing 0-1, then Alexander Grunwald was sent off and Astra Giurgiu scored twice in the last minutes (the last from the penalty spot) to win the match.
Many people probably weren’t impressed with Astra Giurgiu’s qualification, since they “only” finished above Czechs and Austrians, not “glamorous” opponents like Lyon or West Ham.
And their next opponent isn’t “glamorous” as well, just Genk from Belgium.
Will Astra Giurgiu fairytale have some more chapters, or it ends here with Genk?
Astra Giurgiu is very good in pre-group stage KO rounds – they advanced in eight of their eleven clashes over the last four seasons. Are they also that good in post-group stage KO rounds?
Austria Wien was eliminated in a group stage for the sixth consecutive time.
They were also the worst Austrian team, finishing last with only 5 points, while Rapid Wien finished third with 6 and FC Salzburg third with 7.
They got 5 points from their first three matches (winning in Romania and getting a spectacular 3-3 in Italy), but then couldn’t get a single point in their remaining three matches!
All they needed was one win in any of these three matches to advance. They should be devastated, they were the exact opposite of Astra Giurgiu, a great start and then they just stopped when they were in a good situation.
Roma will have an interesting clash against Villarreal next.
Both teams were eliminated in the CL qualifiers - UEFA doesn’t want that to happen in the future so will give them direct qualification to the groups (not necessarily to Roma or Villarreal, to Italy and Spain’s 4th placed teams).
They have other things in common, they were both eliminated in this last 32 round in the first EL edition in 2009/2010 – Roma against Panathinaikos and Villarreal against Wolfsburg.
And after that they were never again eliminated in the EL last 32 round although both have been eliminated earlier in 2011/2012 (Villarreal had that 0-0-6 CL campaign, while Roma lost to Slovan Bratislava in the EL qualifiers).
But the similarities don’t end here, both “disappeared” in the following two seasons, and both returned in 2014/2015, where again both were eliminated exactly in the same round, the EL last 16, by teams from their own country (Villarreal by Sevilla and Roma by Fiorentina).
And when Roma survives the CL groups (2010/2011, 2015/2016), Villarreal replies with EL semis in the same seasons!
Will they remain so equal that this will only be solved in a penalty shootout?