Wednesday’s soccer news starts with a preview of tomorrow’s Europa League semifinal second-legs. Tyler Adams’s RB Leipzig is on the road ant James Sands’s Rangers a goal up but facing an Ibrox crowd. Leipzig lost 3-1 at Gladbach on Monday, while Rangers drew 1-1 at Celtic.
“Rangers will play differently at home than they did last week,” RB Leipzig coach Domenico Tedesco said. “The crowd will be a factor.”
In the other semifinal, Timmy Chandler’s Eintracht took a 2-1 lead home from London in their series with West Ham United. Eintracht lost 2-0 at Bayer Leverkusen on Monday with West Ham losing 2-1 at home to Arsenal on Sunday.
“With our fans behind us, we’re going for a win from the first second, and our approach has to be to challenge their defense,” Eintracht coach Oliver Glasner said. “We need an even better performance than in the first-leg.”
Konrad De La Fuente is injured and will miss Olympique Marseille’s attempt to come back at home against Cole Bassett’s Feyenoord. Marseille lost 3-2 in Rotterdam and 3-0 on Sunday at home to Lyon in Ligue 1. Feyenoord won 3-1 at Fortuna Sittard on Sunday in the Eredivisie.
“We played well and scored three times, but we also saw that Marseille have many qualities,” Feyenoord coach Arne Slot said. “You could say it’s a shame we didn’t win by a bigger margin, but at times we also got away with conceding more. They play with a fairly high last line and stay upfield a long time before going back. That’s why we often got one-on-one with their keeper. But they have a very good team.”
Later today, Zack Steffen’s Manchester City will either be looking forward to playing Liverpool for the Champions League title or wondering what happened at Real Madrid up 4-3. Liverpool advanced 5-2 on aggregate over Villarreal after winning the second-leg 3-2. That score is a bit deceptive, with Villarreal leveling the score on aggregate by the 41st minute. That required a Liverpool comeback, scoring three unanswered goals from the 6n2 to the 74th minute to put the series away.
“The start was obviously really difficult for us to take,” Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp said. “We were obviously impressed by that. We had no real build-up, we didn’t play in the right spaces, all of a sudden we just kicked long balls and tried to force it. We had, kind of, dangers, but never enough to get a little bit of momentum. So we just explained to the boys where we have to play, what we have to do, where we have to be stronger and where we have to move smarter because obviously in the first-half we didn’t move enough.”
Football365’s Dave Tickner with Liverpool still in contention across all competitions. ESPN’s Mark Ogden with what it took for Liverpool to see out the semifinal. SI’s Jonathan Wilson focuses on the need for Liverpool’s comeback. SI’s Sid Lowe on Liverpool’s ability to sub in game changers.
THURSDAY’S SOCCER TV
Europa League semifinal second-legs on Galavision: Rangers vs RB Leipzig at 3pm with Leipzig up 1-0. UniMas has Eintracht vs West Ham at 3pm with Eintracht leading 2-1. Copa Libertadores on beIN Sport: Fortaleza vs River Plate at 6pm, RB Bragantino vs Velez Sarsfield at 8pm, and Alianza Lima vs Colo-Colo at 10pm ET.
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