The "little brother" of the UEFA Champions League, the Europa League is now increasingly attracting the interest of football fans. On March 18th, the draw for the quarterfinals took place, in which eight strong European clubs took part, striving to win the honorary trophy.
Despite the fact that not all world football stars take part in the Europa League, this tournament is very popular among the audience. The UEFA Europa League is a competition that brings together clubs from many countries, often not recognized for their outstanding teams. The geography of the Europa League is very extensive.
Starting from the stage of the Europa League quarterfinals, all participating clubs begin to take the competition seriously, because the final match is very close, a victory in which since 2015 gives the right to take part in the Champions League for the next season. In 2016, several real giants of European football made their way to the quarterfinals stage.
The matches of the quarter-finals of the Europa League 2015 - 2016 will start at the same time - on the evening of Thursday, April 7th. The return games will take place in seven days - on the 14th of the same month.
- The Spanish “Villarreal”, successfully performing in the current La Liga season, will play their first match at home against the Czech “Sparta”. The Spartans surprised the whole football world with their victory over the Roman “Lazio”. This result makes Czech footballers take very seriously.
- Portuguese Braga will play their first match at home on April 7th. The opponents of the 2011 Europa League finalists are Shakhtar Donetsk players. The Ukrainian club beat the German Schalke 04 very confidently. At the moment, it is difficult to single out a favorite in the confrontation.
- As in the Champions League quarter-finals, the Europa League offers fans a Spanish pair. Athletic Bilbao will compete for the semi-finals with the current cup winner Sevilla. Matches between Spaniards in European competition are always unpredictable.
- The most interesting quarterfinals are considered to be the pair “Liverpool” - “Borussia” (Dortmund). This is not just a meeting between the two flagships of English and German football. These are the clubs that are considered the main contenders for the 2016 UEFA Cup. In addition, of particular interest is the fact that the current head coach of Liverpool Jurgen Klopp coached Dortmund before the British and even went with the latter to the Champions League final. The confrontation between these clubs will be a real decoration of the current Europa League.