The European season is over for Club Brugge. After a 1-1 draw at Dynamo Kiev in the sixteenth final of the Europa League, a 0-1 defeat against the fellow outflower from the Champions League followed on Thursday-evening. Manchester United came back 0-0 against Real Sociedad after an earlier 0-4 win; Leicester City is out after a 0-0 draw and a 0-2 defeat against Slavia Prague.
Club Brugge – Dynamo Kiev 0-1
The last Belgian hope in the Europa League was pinned on the team of acting trainer Rik De Mil, who performed the honors by a corona infection at Philippe Clement, as Royal Antwerp was eliminated earlier in the evening after a goal-rich game by Rangers FC (5- 2). Club, which still had to do without the sick Noa Lang and Stefano Denswil, was able to let Dynamo Kiev make the game given the advantageous intermediate score. However, the Ukrainian formation did not succeed, as not a single shot on target was produced until the half-time signal. Bas Dost created danger on the other side with a header between the posts, but also Blue-black did not score before half time.
Ten minutes after the break, Dost had another chance to head, although he was unable to get goalkeeper Georgi Bushchan into serious trouble. Shortly afterwards, the Dutch striker pulled his hamstring, forcing him to be replaced by Youssouph Badji. Despite this, Club eagerly kept looking for the attack and Ruud Vormer, among others, came close to a goal. Seven minutes before the end of regular time, the home team unexpectedly got the lid on the nose. Gerson Rodrigues served with a nice lob in the sixteen Viktor Tsygankov, who in turn had a good pass on Vitaliy Buyalskyi. It was then a breeze for the latter to round off and plunge the Belgians into deep mourning: 0-1.
Manchester United – Real Sociedad 0-0
Although the diptych was almost decided, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer opted for a strong line-up with four changes compared to Sunday’s league game against Newcastle United (3-1 win): David de Gea, Harry Maguire, Luke Shaw and Marcus Rashford for Dean Henderson, Eric Bailly, Alex Telles and Mason Greenwood respectively. If Real Sociedad had wanted to have any prospect of a comeback, an early penalty from Mikel Oyarzabal should have resulted in a goal. After a faltering run-up, the left winger, however, shot far wide of the goal, after a foul by Daniel James on Andoni Gorosabel.
Halfway through the first half, Manchester United were also close to the opening goal. A daring lob from Bruno Fernandes landed on the crossbar. Not much later, James bumped into keeper Alejandro Remiro in a promising position, making it 0-0 before half time. Four minutes after the break, Modibo left Sagnan to head Real Sociedad ahead, hitting the bar on a free kick by Ander Barrenetxea. After more than an hour of play, a goal by substitute Axel Tuanzebe was disallowed due to a foul by Victor Lindelöf on Jon Bautista that preceded it. Manchester United therefore had to settle for a draw and is still active on three fronts.
Leicester City 0-2 Slavia Prague
Leicester started the meeting with offensive intentions, which was led by referee Serdar Gözübüyük. Still arrived the Foxes soon found out that Slavia intended to sell the hide dearly, because the hosts did not get much further than Marc Albrighton’s shooting opportunity in the first half. Although the visitors had less the ball and no shot was placed between the posts, Slavia found the crucial away goal four minutes after the break. A cross from the right was not appreciated by the Leicester defense, giving Lukás Provod the freedom to tap at the far post: 0-1. The home team’s hopes for a positive end result were definitely lost more than ten minutes before the end, when Abdallah Sima put the 0-2 final score on the scoreboard at the request of Peter Olayinka.
