Villarreal – Sporting Lisboa

Villarreal welcomes Sporting Lisboa in a second game from the 1/8-finals of Europa League. Let’s see what’s the situation with these two teams at this moment.

The Spanish side have the advantage here after a 1-0 win at the Estadio Jose Alvalade in the first leg. Many people considered Sporting a favourite here, because of Villarreal’s complicated situation in La Liga. But the Yellow Submarine surprised a lot of people, winning the game with a goal form Alfonso Pedraza after just 3 minutes of playing. Now Sporting’s task is a little bit more complicated because of this home loss.

How we said, Villarreal are in a really huge trouble in La Liga right now. The Yellow Submarine is in the relegation zone of the league, being 18th in the standings with 23 points. The win over Sevilla in the previous round put Villarreal in a better position to chase survival, but they are still in big trouble. They have a good team, so it’s going to be really surprising if they get relegated to Segunda Division.

Meanwhile Sporting are 4th in the Primeira Liga with 45 points. This season is not good for the Lions. Marcel Keizer’s boys are just too inconsistent, which is the reason why Sporting is trailing on 9 points behind the leader Porto. This is surely not the position the Lions would like to find themselves at.

Because of the result in the first leg, now Villarreal are a slight favourite against Sporting to progress in Europa Leaue. But because of their situation in La Liga, it won’t be surprising if the Spanish side decides to prioritize the domestic league. This gives Sporting a good chance to fix their mistake from the first match and actually qualify for the 1/8-finals of the competition.