Mystify Soccer - European Cup Reaches Semis

European Cup Reaches Semis

Stage 2 of the European cup has just been completed with the qualifying teams probably being the expected ones.

Full credit should go to Brechin City though as, despite only just scraping through to this stage, they were pretty close to reaching the semi-finals and had they nicked an extra goal in their home game against Coventry then they would have qualified! They could also have got through had Oxford done them a favour and beat Coventry in the final round of the stage but with Oxford having already qualified, the required motivation wasn't on show and there were defensive errors aplenty in a 5-4 victory for Coventry.

Airdrie United may as well not bothered reaching this stage as they threw in the towel early on and struggled to make any impact, scoring a measly 2 goals in the process. The same could be said for Politechnica Iasi but they are relative newcomers to the European cup competition and will surely be happier finishing bottom of the group in stage 2 than last seasons dismal effort where they finished bottom of the group in stage 1!

Airdrie's pathetic involvement led to a seven nil thrashing to Hamburger in their final game. This actually assisted Hamburger in finishing top of Group B when they were probably happy enough to nick 2nd spot. The match of the stage was actually the other final round match in Group B between Recreativo de Huelva and RKC Waalwijk. With a victory being required by RKC for guaranteed qualification and Recreative needing to avoid defeat the nerves showed early on and RKC took the lead 3 times in the first 25 minutes. Holding on would have given them a much needed victory. Unfortunately their holding on tactics were a little too aggressive and 2 red cards enabled Recreativo to get back on top of the game and score the equalising goal to put them through in second place.

The draw for the semi finals pits Coventry City against Recreativo de Huelva and Hamburger SV against Oxford United. If there isn't going to be a repeat of last seasons final then one or both of the English teams have got to perform on the day, something Oxford failed to do in the same semi-final last season.