Europa League - 2nd Qualifying Round - 1st leg Malmo 2-0 Hibernian Rosenberg 0-1 St.Johnstone Not a great result for Hibs but, going by the text commentary it could have been a hell of a lot worse. Malmo currently lead the Swedish league and are half way through their season, so with that in mind, this was always going to be a tough match up. However, if Hibs can score first and get Easter Road going then there is still a chance of them advancing. Going to need one hell of a game from them though and a big improvement on the first leg performance. Great result for St.Johnstone! They need to finish it off in Perth now. Rosenberg may not be quite as good as they were a few years ago but again, they are currently on top of the Norwegian league and are half way through their season as well. I hope the saints can finish the job off next week and progress to the next round. I also believe that if they do beat Rosenberg they will then gain their seeding and avoid difficult opponents such as Swansea and Vfb Stuttgart for example. Anyway, good luck to both teams for the 2nd legs.
3rd rd Europa League Qualifying Draw Swansea City v Malmo or Hibernian Valetta FC (Mal) or FC Minsk (BLR) v Rosenberg or St.Johnstone Motherwell v Kuban Krasnodar (Rus)
Just about 25 minutes in at Perth and Easter Road...and there have been goals. After giving up a 4th minute goal to level the tie...St. Johnstone have levelled the match and regained a one goal lead in the tie. Hibs, unfortunately, have conceded a goal to Malmo making the tie 0-3 and needing to score 4 to go through.
Hibs lose 0-7 on the night....0-9 on aggregate. St. Johnstone draw 1-1 on the night......win 2-1 on aggregate. From following the text it seems like Hibs knew their only hope was score first....seemed to have a bit of the play for the first 20 minutes...then Malmo scored..ending hope....capitulation (and embarrassment) followed. St Johnstone gave back their lead from the away leg in the 4th minute and then clawed it back....seemed to play well and give a good account of themselves but were hanging on desperately in the last 20 minutes (that is what happens when wee clubs from countries still in pre-season training play bigger clubs from leagues that are 20 games into their domestic schedule). Scottish football is 50/50 on the night!
Congratulations to St.Johnstone. What can you say about Hibs? I suppose it resurrects the old argument of giving success to a failure (losing cup finalist) instead of rewarding a team that has performed consistently well in the league. These capitulations will continue to eat into our already ailing European club co-efficient. Here's hoping either St.Johnstone or (or both) Motherwell can pull off a couple of shocks and make it into the Europa group stages. St.Johnstone have the far kinder draw in the next round.
half time in the first of two Europa League matches involving Scottish teams and St. Johnstone seem to be doing ok....FC Minsk 0 - 0 St. Johnstone
Hibs should never have been allowed to compete in Europe this season. As mentioned above I find it incredulous we still reward failure (losing cup finalists) instead of giving the slot to a team that deserves it due to their league campaign. Well done St. Johnstone. Another 1-0 away win . As stated on BBC website last night, it's just like the Liverpool team of the 70's . Brilliant! Motherwell were always going to struggle against the Russians. I was hoping they might have got a result that would have given them a little bit of hope for the 2nd leg but that was all but extinguished with the 2nd goal.
While either that place goes to a team that was thumped by Celtic in the cup final or to a team that finished 25+ points behind Celtic in the league. The spot is going to a failure either way. That's what the UEFA Cup/Europa League is all about: a competition for teams that failed in the league or were parachuted from the Champions League after failure in that competition. Back in the days of the Cup Winners' Cup and before teams parachuted in from the Champions League, the UEFA Cup consisted entirely of teams that did not win a major trophy the season before.
But a team that 'wins' a spot either in the new Europa League or the old UEFA cup did so on merit over other teams in that country. Hibs were a shambles at times last season. The 2x clubs in the north (ICT and Ross County) deserved to be given the chance to compete in Europe due to their far better performances throughout the course of the league campaign. Either one would have provided a far tougher test to Malmo than Hibs did. St.Johnstone are proof that Scottish teams(outwith Celtic) are still more than capable of challenging Scandinavian teams and the like.
Could the same not be said of Hibs....they got to the final (something only two teams did) and lost...but they lost to a team that had already qualified for Europe through another competition. If Hibs had beat Celtic (and, therefore, in your thinking had earned the place by winning something) would they have given Malmo a better tie? Surely the Hibs debacle was the result of two things....the overall mess of the Scottish game and the resultant need to enter these qualifying stages two weeks before the start of their season against teams half way through theirs. It has less to do with how Hibs (or any Scottish team) got into the tie in the first place.
How many games did Hibs need to win to get to the final as opposed to ICT who finished 4th in the league. I realise Hibs points total isn't far off ICT's but bear in mind Hibs final 5 matches were against bottom 6 teams whilst ICT were playing top 6 teams. Obviously the main reason we are entering so early is due to our co-efficient steadily dropping. A part of that is due to losing cup finalists being hammered out of Europe early doors. I recall a few 1st division teams gaining entry this way and losing in similar circumstances (although maybe not so heavily). I'm not saying it is the sole reason for our decline in Europe but, in my opinion, it certainly is part of it and I'd prefer to see teams who have proven themselves over a season being given the opportunity to compete in Europe as opposed to a team that has gotten to a final after 5 or 6 cup matches.
You are not the only one that has that opinion but if there was no Europe for Cup Winners then those cups (which, IMO, are an integral part of the games history) would lose even more relevance within the domestic games. At least it is not England where, on a few ocassions, teams have been relegated and qualified for Europe through cups in the same season.
Yeah, but AFAIK every other league in Europe follows the same rule (losing Cup finalist qualifies for Europe if the Cup winner qualifies already based on league ranking). So its fair in that sense and Scotland isn't at any disadvantage.
It's an UEFA rule, so Scotland has no say in this anyway. FAs can't randomly decide which clubs get a spot.
Yes they can. UEFA gives the spots (based on the country coefficient......each country has some scope to decide how they get allocated. Ie.....some countries grant a spot to their league cup winner.....some don't
No. The regulations are perfectly clear on this. See Article II in the official rule book: http://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles.../Regulations/01/94/62/40/1946240_DOWNLOAD.pdf FAs can enter the winner of a secondary cup competition, but this is provided for in the competition rules as well. The entry list is always: 1. Cup winner or runners-up, if both are qualified for the CL then league 2. league (depending on how many spots the FA has) 3. final spot: secondary cup winner or league So the League Cup isn't relevant to the spot for the cup winner at all, and can be ignored for the purpose of this thread.
Oh well. Close this thread up for another year. Motherwell were already on their way out but not sure what it says when you leave a lot of your best players at home at the half way point of a 2-legged tie. If Motherwell could have conjured up the first goal then it could have made things interesting. As it is McCall basically threw in the towel before the 2nd leg kicked off. Not sure what kind of example that sets to the players taking to the pitch or how the fans that travelled to Russia feel about it. And St.Johnstone blew it. Did the hard part by winning away from home and lost it at home. I didn't think they would. All last night, even after they conceded, I was certain they would score. But they didn't and now they're out. It would have been nice to have seen their name in the final round today.