UEFA Europa League: Tottenham Hotspur, Rangers, Lyon And Olympiacos Book Spot In Last 16 – News18

Last Updated:January 31, 2025, 07:36 is

Lazio, Athletic Bilbao, Manchester United, Tottenham, Eintracht Frankfurt, Lyon, Olympiakos, Rangers qualified for the Europa League last 16 directly.

Tottenham Hotspur eased to a 3-0 victory over Swedish side Elfsborg with youngsters Dane Scarlett, Damola Ajayi and Mikey Moore all netting their first goals for the club.

The victory saw Spurs finish fourth, although their joy was dampened slightly by an injury to defender Radu Dragusin.

“I’m sure those boys won’t sleep tonight, but we needed that. We needed some energy — we kind of designed the game today, we’re trying to protect some of our players, we’ve got a big week coming up, and we were going to need the young boys today, and they stood up,” under-pressure manager Ange Postecoglou said.

Rangers began the evening outside the top eight but a 2-1 home victory against Belgians Union Saint-Gilloise and results elsewhere enabled them to jump into eighth place and avoid having to enter the knockout phase playoffs.

Nico Raskin headed the opening goal and Vaclav Cerny slotted a second for Rangers.

Lazio finished top of the rankings although they suffered a 1-0 defeat at Braga. Ricardo Horta’s sixth-minute goal proved enough for the Portuguese side although they bowed out after finishing 25th in the league.

Second-placed Athletic Bilbao beat Viktoria Plzen 3-1 with Nico Williams, Yeray Alvarez and Javier Marton on target.

AS Roma secured their place in the playoffs with a 2-0 home win over German side Eintracht Frankfurt who still reached the last-16 automatically by coming fifth.

Goals from Angelino and Eldor Shomurodov made sure Roma finished in 15th spot.

Olympique Lyonnais secured direct entry to the last 16 despite a lacklustre 1-1 home draw against already-eliminated Ludogorets.

Corentin Tolisso opened the scoring early in the second half after benefiting from a defensive blunder before Dinis Almeida levelled with 13 minutes left.

Greek side Olympiacos finished seventh to go directly to the last 16 after a resounding 3-0 win over Qarabag.

Jose Mourinho’s Fenerbahce scraped into the playoffs in 24th position with a 2-2 draw at Midtjylland proving just enough as other results went in their favour.

Former European champions Porto also flirted with elimination but a 1-0 win over Maccabi Tel-Aviv courtesy of a Nico Gonzalez goal helped them to 18th place and playoff.

(With inputs from Agencies)

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London, United Kingdom (UK)