UEFA Cup Round up

03 October 2008

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There were celebrations and commiserations for the British teams in the UEFA cup last night with Aston Villa, Portsmouth, Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspurs progressing to the next stage while Everton and Motherwell were dumped out of the competition.

Villa booked their place in the group stages after a 1-1 draw with Litex Lovech and a 4-2 win on aggregate.

Marlon Harewood put the home side ahead on 27 minutes with a powerful shot from 12 yards, his first goal of the season.

Wilfried Niflore brought Lovech level when he converted a penalty on 52 minutes after Carlos Cuellar was penalised for bringing down Wellington da Silva.

The Bulgarians failed to trouble Villa's defence and the home side took control for the final half hour.

Portsmouth had to wait till extra time to secure their place in UEFA's group stage.

A dismal first half at Guimaraes saw Douglas put the home side in the lead and Joao Alves's 40-yard free-kick made it 2-0 just after the half hour mark.

Pompey battled on in the second half, but were unable to prevent extra time.

After 105 minutes Crouch headed in Glen Johnson's cross before Nadir Belhadj set him up to net the ball from 16 yards giving the South coaster team a 4-2 win overall.

Manchester City were the next side to secure a 4-2 overall win beating Omonia Nicosia 2-1 with second half goals from Elano and Shaun Wright-Phillips

Micah Richards forced an early save from Antonis Georgallides just 2 minutes in but his header was straight at the Omonia goalkeeper, who did not have another save to make in the half.

After a poor first half for City Elano broke the deadlock finishing a pass from Robinho with a shot into the bottom corner.

Wright-Phillips made it 2-0 soon after, firing home after riding two tackles.

Rasheed Alabi replied with a late header for Omonia but it was not enough.

Tottenham brushed aside their poor League form, holding Wisla Krakow to a 1-1 draw, winning 2-3 on aggregate and going through to the group stages.

Spurs went 0-1 up after 58 minutes when Arkadiusz Glowacki deflected Gareth Bale's cross into his own net.

Polish champions Wisla enjoyed the better chances throughout the game, Mauro Cantoro threatened first, breaking through a static Spurs backline only to finish tamely with only Gomes to beat on 20 minutes.

Brozek's lob towards the end levelled the game but visitors Spurs hung on in a frantic finale.

It was a bad night for Everton as they went out of the Cup losing 2-1 to Standard Liege and 4-3 on aggregate.

Despite an impressive start from the visitors, Axel Witsel volleyed home for Liege in the first half. Phil Jagielka gave Everton hope with a second-half equaliser.

Liege keeper Rorys Aragon dropped the ball twice and Jagielka was lurking a few yards out to stab home.

But Belgium's league leaders guaranteed their progress with Milan Jovanovic's penalty, after what seemed to be a fair tackle from Leighton Baines.

Scotland's representation, Motherwell crashed out of the competition after a 2-0 defeat at French side AS Nancy saw them loose 3-0 on aggregate.

Marc-Antoine Fortune's close-range effort and Benjamin Gavanon's free-kick within 25 minutes killed the tie.

Despite a bright start things came unstuck for the Scots in the 17th minute when Paul Quinn conceded a free-kick about 20 yards from goal.

Gavanon's effort was brilliantly saved by goalkeeper Graeme Smith, but Marc-Antoine Fortune was quickest to react and he fired low into the net to give Nancy a crucial away goal.

Things got worse after 23 minutes when Benjamin Gavanon's free-kick drifted into the six-yard box, and with no-one able to clear, the ball bounced once before finding the corner of the net.

With Nancy swarming forward at every opportunity in the second half, only their Smith in front of goal spared Motherwell a heavier defeat.

The rest of last night's results:

Ajax 2-0 (agg 6-1) Borac Cacak

Artmedia Petrzalka 0-2 (agg 0-6) Braga

Benfica 2-0 (agg 4-3) Napoli

Club Bruges 2-0 (agg 4-2) Young Boys

Deportivo La Coruna 2-0 (agg 2-2) SK Brann (Deportivo La Coruna win 3-2 on penalties)

Dinamo Bucharest 0-0 (agg 0-1) NEC

FBK Kaunas 1-2 (agg 1-7) Sampdoria

FC Copenhagen 1-1 (agg 3-2) FC Moscow

FC Honka 0-1 (agg 0-2) Racing Santander

FC Metalist Kharkiv 4-1 (agg 4-2) Besiktas

Twente Enschede 1-0 (agg 2-2) Rennes (FC Twente win on away goals)

FC Vaslui 1-1 (agg 1-1) Slavia Prague (Slavia Prague win on away goals)

FC Zurich 0-1 (agg 1-4) AC Milan

Galatasaray 2-1 (agg 6-4) Bellinzona

Heerenveen 5-2 (agg 6-3) Vitoria Setubal

Kalmar FF 1-2 (agg 2-2) Feyenoord

Lech Poznan 4-2 (agg 5-4) FK Austria Vienna

Levski Sofia 0-1 (agg 1-2) MSK Zilina

Olympiakos 5-0 (agg 7-0) FC Nordsjaelland

PSG 0-0 (agg 2-1) Kayserispor

Partizan Belgrade 1-0 (agg 3-1) Politehnica Timisoara

Rapid Bucuresti 1-1 (agg 1-2) Wolfsburg

Rosenborg 3-2 (agg 5-3) Brondby

SV Red Bull Salzburg 0-2 (agg 0-4) Sevilla

Schalke 04 1-1 (agg 5-2) Apoel Nicosia

Sparta Prague 3-3 (agg 3-3) Dinamo Zagreb

Spartak Moscow 1-1 (agg 2-1) Banik Ostrava

St Etienne 2-1 (agg 4-2) Hapoel Tel-Aviv

Udinese 0-2 (agg2-2) Borussia Dortmund Udinese win 4-3 on penalties

Unirea Urziceni 0-2 (agg 0-2) Hamburg

Valencia 2-1 (agg 3-1) Maritimo

VfB Stuttgart 2-2 (agg 4-3) Cherno More

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