The Europa League quarter-finals is upon us with Manchester united taking on FC Copenhagen and Inter Milan facing Bayer Levekusen. Sevilla play Wolverhampton Wanderers and Shakhtar Donetsk going up against Basel in the other quarter-final clashes.
A look at whats happening around European football on Monday with the first two Europa League quarterfinals:
MAN UNITED VS COPENHAGEN
Manchester United is the overwhelming favorite to beat its Danish opponent but coach Ole Gunnar Solskjaer remembers when the two teams met in 2006. He was on the United team when it was beaten 1-0 in Copenhagen in the Champions League group stage that year. The coach that day, and on Monday in Cologne, is Solskjaer’s former Norway teammate Stale Solbakken. All quarterfinals are being played over a single leg in Germany without fans.
INTER MILAN VS BAYER LEVERKUSEN
Inter Milan is bidding to end a nine-year wait for a trophy but it has to get past a Leverkusen team with ambitions of its own in Dusseldorf. Inter looked briefly unsettled by Getafe’s high-intensity pressing in the last 16 last week before Romelu Lukaku and Christian Eriksen scored in a 2-0 win. Leverkusen wants to win the Europa League on German soil to secure Champions League qualification, something Inter has already assured through placing second in Serie A.
OTHER QUARTERS
The other two quarterfinals are played Tuesday. The only five-time winner of the competition, Sevilla, plays Wolverhampton, which is hoping for its first European final since 1972. Also, Shakhtar Donetsk plays Basel.
(With inputs from AP)
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