Europa League 2017/2018: Groups J K L

[Duketown]

Tomorrow we have Zulte - Vitesse. Representing 2 of the most worsted performing countries in this years UEFA ranking. The Netherlands is performing equal to no. 33, Hungary while Belgium is even performing worse. At least some points will go to either one of them.

[bugylibicska]

Group J:
Zorya reached the point I`d not bet against them! Still hard to believe: Ostersund 7, Zorya 6, Athletic Bilbao 2 and Hertha 1 point! Now almost 10 thousand spectators went to watch them in Lviv, still not a big crowd, but growing. Even the bookies see them as favourites, but I don`t trust them.
To win the group:
Ostersund 2.10
Zorya 3.00
Bilbao 3.75
Hertha 21.00
A truly fascinating and unbelievable story, 2 small teams from countries far from the top lead ahead of 2 ``giants`` from the best leagues.

[Dragonite]

Group J is the craziest in EL!

Ostersund (in theory the weakest team in the EL) is leading it with 7 points!

Apparently for every point that they collect, their victims in the qualifiers such as Galatasaray and PAOK feel a little bit less depressed about their defeats against them.


And even Zorya, that last season couldn’t win a single EL match and this time started with a home defeat against (apparently harmless) Ostersund, now won for the second time in a row and is comfortably in the second spot!



And they’ll keep that position for at least another round no matter what (or even better, climb to the first place if they win in Germany and Ostersund doesn’t in Spain)!


Athletic Bilbao is the worst pot 1 team so far.
The last (and only) time that they couldn’t win any of their first three EL group stage matches, in 2012/2013, they couldn’t advance from the group stages. Will it happen again?
In theory they now have two home games where they “should” recover. Yet, the home game was precisely the one that they lost (plus two away draws).


Hertha Berlin actually has a more encouraging precedent it its smaller EL history.
In 2009/2010 they also had only 1 point from their first three matches, and then won the last three and advanced to the next round. Will it happen again?


In Group K, expected win for Lazio in France.
And Zulte Waregem and Vitesse are so bad that they can’t even defeat each other. Is a draw the result to expect when they meet again in Holland?

Lazio should now secure qualification to the next round with another win against Nice, who will also join them sooner or later when they get back to facing the two harmless teams from this group.


In Group K, expected wins for Zenit and Real Sociedad.

If for every point that Ostersund collects its victims feel a little bit less embarrassed about their defeats, then for every defeat that Vardar gets, it’s probably much more embarrassing for Malmo and Fenerbahçe than for Vardar.

They should keep wondering over and over again “How could these guys eliminate us?”

Zenit will now secure qualification to the next round if they don’t lose in Norway.

Real Sociedad still has a small threat from Rosenborg, but if they open a 6 points gap in round 4, then they can even afford to lose 0-3 in Norway and still progress. So Rosenborg really must get at least a point from Zenit to keep things remotely interesting in this group (preferably a win, but maybe that’s asking too much?)

[Dragonite]

In Group J, finally some “normal” results, with Athletic Bilbao and Hertha Berlin winning for the first time.

This is the closest group, the distance between the first placed and the last placed is only 3 points.

Hertha Berlin will be eliminated in round 5 if they lose in Spain.

Athletic Bilbao won’t be eliminated in round 5 even if they lose at home against Hertha Berlin. They won’t be qualified in round 5 either, even if they win, they’ll just eliminate Hertha Berlin.

Zorya won’t be eliminated in round 5 either.
They’ll only be qualified if they win in Sweden and Hertha Berlin wins in Spain.

Ostersund will be already qualified in round 5, if and only if they defeat Zorya at home and there isn’t a winner in Athletic Bilbao vs. Hertha Berlin.


In Group K, Lazio already won the group and is the best team in EL so far!



They’re the “best team” because they are in a group with 3 “pot 4” teams, as og2002gr would say it. As soon as they start facing better opposition in the following rounds, we’ll see how good they really are.

Vitesse somehow is still alive despite having only 1 point.
They can still advance if… they win twice and there isn’t a winner in Nice vs. Zulte Waregem and Zulte Waregem can’t defeat Lazio and Vitesse’s win against Nice must also be 5-0 or better.
They’re in a great position, aren’t they?

The details of their round 4 defeat against Zulte Waregem are hilarious… They scored an own goal, then they were playing in numerical advantage after the 22nd minute with Madu’s red card, but only for 30 minutes because then they also had a red card… then their goalkeeper Pasveer conceded again in Zulte’s only shot on goal… This looks like an anecdote, with more things too like hitting the posts, disallowed goals… but this all actually happened!

Zulte is in a much better position, if they win in France in round 5 they’ll climb to the second spot, and then to keep it all they need is a home win in round 6 against Lazio.
Alternatively, they can draw in France and then wish that Nice will lose in Holland while they win the home match against Lazio.

Nice will qualify in round 5 if they win at home against Zulte Waregem (an opponent that they already defeated away 5-1 only a few weeks ago).



Finally, in Group L, Zenit is already qualified!



Vardar is already eliminated. And they’re only two simple defeats away of being the worst team in EL history: Shamrock Rovers got a 0-0-6 with a goal difference of -15, while Vardar is already 0-0-4 with a goal difference of -16.

So the fight for qualification here is really simple, Rosenborg is five points behind Real Sociedad, so to catch them, they must win twice, and hope that Real Sociedad doesn’t win against Zenit.
Since Zenit already lost a round 6 “meaningless” match against AZ Alkmaar last season, I wouldn’t expect them to help Rosenborg this time.
Plus, let’s say that Zenit gets a draw in Spain… Then Rosenborg’s win against Real Sociedad in round 6 must be 5-0 or better, or they’ll finish leveled on points but with worse head-to-head.

Even if Rosenborg can’t finish top 2, they should try to get as many points as they can, they never got more than 6 in one season, let’s see if this time they can get at least 7 (all they have to do is defeating Vardar again).

[bugylibicska]

Ostersunds: Rise of Swedish club under English manager Graham Potter

By Phil Dawkes & Kevin Kirrane
BBC Sport
1 hour ago From the sectionEuropean Football

http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/41902664

[Dragonite]

In Group J, congratulations Ostersund!!!!!



I actually have a challenge for them for EL round 6.

They already eliminated Galatasaray, Fola, PAOK, and advanced from an EL group with Zorya, Hertha Berlin and Athletic Bilbao.
They’re the best Swedish team ever in EL history.
If they win another match, they’ll become bigger than all the other Swedish teams together. I challenge them to do it already in their remaining group stage match against Hertha Berlin.
They have 10 points; if they win they’ll finish with 13 points.
AIK got 4 in 2012, Elfsborg got 4 in 2013, Helsingborg got 4 in 2012, and Malmo got 1 in 2011.
So if that happens, Ostersund (13) >= AIK (4) + Elfsborg (4) + Helsingborg (4) + Malmo (1)


The Zorya vs. Athletic Bilbao fight for the remaining qualifying spot will be interesting.

Athletic Bilbao only needs a draw, while Zorya must win.
Zorya already defeated Athletic Bilbao once this season, when Athletic Bilbao still had some leeway. Now Athletic Bilbao can’t afford to fail, or the season will be over. Will Zorya be able to defeat them again?


Hertha was very disappointing.
I think they had much bigger responsibilities here than Hoffenheim in Group C or FC Koln in Group H or even Leipzig in their CL group.
Hertha was “supposed to” advance, none of the others was, not in my opinion at least.

Possibly this was even worse than the Brondby elimination last season, as that was one match only, they could try to get away with “one bad day” excuse…
Here they can’t even use that, they had 450 minutes to collect more points than their opponents, one “accident” was reversible.
Getting 4 points from possible 15 is no accident, they’re just terrible!



In Group K, as expected Nice advanced in the second place behind Lazio!



I would like to see them in an EL last 32 clash against… Napoli!
Probably they wouldn’t like it, and would prefer to keep facing the likes of Zulte Waregem and Vitesse forever. But there aren’t teams like those anymore in the EL KO stages.


Finally, in Group L, Real Sociedad as expected advanced alongside Zenit!



But unlike Nice in Group K, they still have a chance to win the group too. All they have to do is winning their remaining game, at home against Zenit.

In the other match, Vardar is one defeat away from being the worst team in EL history. Let’s see if they can avoid that.

[Dragonite]

Prediction
1. Athletic Bilbao
2. Hertha Berlin
3. Ostersund
4. Zorya

Congratulations Athletic Bilbao!



They had a slow start, but still recovered to win the group.
Last season they were only second placed behind Genk and then were immediately eliminated in the last 32 round, while Genk went all the way to the quarter finals.
This time, as group winners, perhaps they’ll be the ones going all the way to the quarter finals.

Zorya had a 200% improvement compared to last season but it still wasn’t enough.

Prediction
1. Lazio
2. Nice
3. Zulte Waregem
4. Vitesse

Vitesse took advantage of a generous Nice to finally win a game here, but Zulte Waregem got the same gift from Lazio, so in the end these two teams leave the competition with the illusion (5 points for Vitesse, 7 points for Zulte, and 9 points for Nice) that they “almost” reached the next stage.

Prediction
1. Zenit
2. Real Sociedad
3. Rosenborg
4. Vardar

Congratulations Zenit for winning the group, and congratulations Vardar for not ending with a 0-0-6!