Villarreal up next for Liverpool after heroic Anfield fightback
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JURGEN Klopp’s Liverpool earned a Europa League semifinal against Villarreal after its heroic comeback against his former side Borussia Dortmund.
Defending champion Sevilla faces Ukraine’s Shakhtar Donetsk in the second semifinal drawn in Nyon yesterday.
Liverpool, which hit back from 0-2 and 1-3 down to beat Borussia 4-3 and progress into the semifinals 5-4 on aggregate, has never played Villarreal before. Sevilla ousted fellow Spaniard Athletic Bilbao on penalties in Thursday’s quarterfinal in its bid to win a third consecutive Europa League.
The final is set for Basel, Switzerland, on May 18. The winner will get a place in next season’s Champions League.
Liverpool is the only unbeaten side left in the competition, and goals from center-backs Mamadou Sakho and Dejan Lovren completed one of the greatest Anfield comebacks against Dortmund.
The first leg will be played in Villareal on April 28, with The Yellow Submarine heading to Merseyside for the return leg on May 5.
The Spanish outfit, currently fourth in La Liga, is looking to reach its maiden major European final, after Europa League last-four defeats in 2004 and 2011 and a Champions League semifinal loss in 2006.
In stark contrast, Liverpool is attempting to win its ninth major continental trophy, and in the process, draw level with Sevilla as the competition’s record four-time winner.
Villarreal has not beaten English opposition in 10 matches, with six draws and four defeats, since beating Liverpool’s city rival Everton in qualifying for the 2005-06 Champions League. But it will be confident that it can see off the Reds after an excellent season so far, in which it has beaten the likes of Real Madrid and Napoli, and drawn with Barcelona.
“We’ll try and win the home leg, without conceding an away goal to make it easier. Then we know it will be difficult away,” said club representative and former midfielder Marcos Senna.
“We are happy with the draw. We did not want to meet Sevilla, we want to meet them in the final.”
Sevilla’s quartet of titles have all come in the last decade, with victory against Espanyol in 2007 making it just the second club after Real Madrid to win the competition in successive years. It backed that performance up by repeating the feat 11 months ago against Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, and now it has another Ukrainian outfit in Shakhtar standing in its way.
The victory over Dnipro puts Sevilla into this season’s Champions League, but it bowed out in the group stages.
Now only a fifth Europa League crown would see it return to Europe’s premier tournament, as Unai Emery’s men sit seventh in La Liga — 12 points behind Villarreal.
The first leg will be played in Seville, before Shakhtar hosts the second game in Lviv.
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