Inside Athletic’s next European rival

Athletic will return to European competition tomorrow in San Mamés. After defeating Real in the derby played on Sunday, the red and whites welcome Elfsborg on the fifth day of the Europa League with qualification for the next round on track after adding ten points to a possible twelve in the previous four games, result. allowing them to finish sixth in the League Phase before the playoffs.

The Swedes cannot say the same. The youth-led group Oscar Hiljemark (32 years old) urgently arrived in Bilbao, with only four points in his locker after one victory, one draw, two defeats, seven goals for and eight against and in twenty-fourth place, the last one which at the moment will give the right to play the play-off round in two legs to earn a place in the round of 16.

The team from the city of Boras started the league with a defeat against AZ Alkmaar (3-2), a rival easily defeated by the lions at home, and then they gave the shock by defeating Roma in their own Boras Sand field ( 1-0). They lost the second game at Galatasaray (4-3) and added a draw at home against Braga (1-1), the former team of Alvaro Djaló. Four other teams have the same points: Porto and Slavia Prague, who occupy the two previous places, and Real Sociedad and Braga, who are located immediately after.

Elfsborg come to Botxo with a large number of continental matches under their belt. Apart from the four mentioned, they had to play four qualifiers to get a ticket to the league. They comfortably solved the first two against the Cypriots of Pafos (3-0 and 2-5) and Moldovans of Sheriff (0-1 and 2-0), they suffered a little in the third against the Croats of Rijeka (1). -1 and 2-0) and they need to be better in the penalty shootout to eliminate Molde in the end after Norway and Sweden 0-1. The pass fell to their side thanks to 4-2 from eleven meters.

Their top scorer in the group was Kenyan midfielder Ouma with two goals and they had one Baidoo, Hedlung, Holman, Hult and Larsson. In the previous ones, the top scorer was the Ghanaian Jalal Abdullai with three targets, more than one Baidoo and Kasem.

Elfsborg became seventh in the 2024 Swedish League, which has ended because it is played in one calendar year, from March to November. The final matchday was settled on Sunday 10th, the lions’ rivals amassed a total of 45 points in 30 matchdays after 13 games won, 6 drawn and 11 lost, with 52 goals scored and 44 losers. The champion is Malmö (65 points), ahead of Hammarby (54), AIK Solna (54), Djurgardens (53), Mjällby (50) and GAIS (48). ‘The yellows’, as they are called because of the color of their clothing, are far from the second place achieved last season which allowed them to compete in the qualifiers of the second continental competition.

The Ghanaian Michael Baidoo He is the leading scorer in the Swedish League, called Allsvenskan. The companion of Inaki Williams With the African team, he found the net on ten occasions. The second in this ranking is the Swedish striker Hedlund (7), while Arbër Zeneli, Ahmed Qasem and Jalal Abdulai They scored five goals each.

good opportunity

The game presents itself as a good opportunity to add three more points and leave the goal of being among the top eight on the track to avoid two games (round trip) of the play off round, something to seriously evaluate in a season as loaded as the current one with three very demanding competitions, League, Cup and Europa League, and a fourth such as the Super Cup with a long trip in between.

There was only one team that performed perfectly in the first four days, Lazio. Next is a group of five teams with ten points consisting of Ajax, Galatasaray, Frankfurt, Anderlecht and Athletic. Those from the Netherlands, who visit Anoeta tomorrow, are second in the table for the best goal difference and the remaining positions from third to sixth are determined by the number of goals scored.