Focused on Villarreal

The last match of the group phase between Lech and Villarreal, which is going to take place on Thursday at 9:00 pm, will decide the final ranks in group C. Everyone in the team and the coaching staff is focusing on the clash with the Spanish opponent. Simultaneously, Hapoel Beer Sheva and Austria Wien – the two other group opponents of Lech – will play against each other and the score of that match might also impact who goes through to the next phase. What needs to happen for Lech to make it to the round of 16? They need to win with last year’s Champions League semi-finalists – that way, their promotion to the knockout stage will be guaranteed regardless of the score of the match Hapoel and Austria. However, if the Israeli team fails to defeat their Austrian opponent, any score at Bułgarska Street will be good enough for the Polish side to advance to the knockout stage.

If Lech draws on Thursday night and Hapoel wins, the two teams will have the same number of points. According to the rules outlined by UEFA, in such a scenario, direct clashes will be the first applied criteria. However, since Lech and Hapoel drew against each other twice, it is the goal ratio that will the decisive factor. At the moment, Lech has a goal difference of +2 (9-7) and Hapoel -1 (4-5).

Hence, the Polish Champions will be eliminated from the competition if Hapoel wins against Austria by a goal difference of more than 4 goals. But there is a chance that Lech and Hapoel will finish with the exact same goal difference. That’s when the point of regulations which says that the team with a higher number of goals scored in the group matches played among the teams in question will be promoted comes into play. In that scenario, Lech is most likely to triumph since otherwise Hapoel and Austria would have to score plenty of goals in Israel and the score would have to be 6:3 if Lech draws 0:0, and 7:4 if John van den Brom’s squad draws 1:1, etc. Therefore, it’s an unlikely scenario.

As outlined above, everything is still in Lech’s hands and the players should primarily focus on their own game. At the beginning of September Lech proved that they could stand us to Villarreal. John van den Brom’s squad managed to equalize 3:3 after being down by two goals, and although they ended up losing 3:4, they delivered a very good performance. The question is, can they play just as well on Thursday?

“We are disappointed with the score against Raków, but the objective now is to bounce back quickly and focus on the match against the Spaniards. We have a very important game ahead of us and we are fully concentrating on it,” said Lech’s winger, Michał Skóraś who has already scored a goal in the first clash against Villarreal.