Dynamo Kyiv hosts Villarreal in the first leg of the Europa League 1/8 finals. The match will be played on Thursday, March 11th at NSC Olimpiyskiy Stadium (Kyiv)
Dynamo Kyiv made it to the group stage of the UEFA Champions League for the first time in a long period. This happened after the team was headed by Mircea Lucescu. The draw gave the White-Blues serious rivals in the person of Juventus and Barcelona, so the favorites of the quartet deservedly gained the tickets to the Champions League playoffs. The Ukrainians managed to take 3rd place. In the 1/16 finals of the Europa League, the White-Blues faced Brugge, which had not allowed them to get in the Champions League in the season before last. The match in Kyiv ended with a score of 1:1. The teams did not show quality football due to bad weather conditions and the importance of the first leg. Many experts dismissed the Ukrainians, but they endured the Belgian domination in the return game and pulled out an important 0:1 victory in the last minutes, having organized an excellent combination. Moreover, Dynamo Kyiv made it to the semifinals of the Ukrainian Cup and gained a 4-point lead over Shakhtar Donetsk in the championship. Therefore, the White-Blues are in high spirits before the upcoming game.
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Villarreal also changed the coaching staff. The team was headed by Unai Emery, who knows how to win the Europa League. Both the game and the results immediately improved. However, the positive dynamics did not last long. The Yellow Submarine was in the TOP-4 of LaLiga for a long time, but recent misfires have led to the fact that the team dropped to the 7th line of the standings. As for the Europa League, the Spaniards won the group without any problems and beat Austrian Salzburg twice in the 1/16 finals (0-2 away and 2-1 at home). Villarreal will approach the first leg of the 1/8 finals in a depressed mood because the team lost two matches in a row with a total score of 1:4. The Yellows lost to the leading Atletico Madrid and depressed Valencia.
We are unlikely to see many goals in the upcoming match. In comparison with the local championship, Dynamo plays and gears up in the European Cups in a different way. There is only one principle - to be reliable in defense and try to score a goal in a counterattack, if the opponent is strong. Having failed to show a super-quality game, the Ukrainians eliminated Brugge. It will not be easy to repeat a similar scenario with Villarreal because this team has individually strong players. However, we will probably see the minimum number of goals scored in the first leg. Moreover, both the hosts and the visitors have some losses in their squads.
Prediction for the match: Under 2.75 goals scored
