Bayer Leverkusen stay on course for Europa League success with win at Roma
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Bayer Leverkusen has made significant progress towards the Europa League final with a well-earned 2-0 victory in the first leg of their semi-final match against Roma at the Stadio Olimpico.
Leverkusen had a good start with Florian Wirtz scoring the first goal before half-time. Robert Andrich added another excellent goal, making the German champions too powerful for the Italians. They now have a 47-game unbeaten run in all competitions this season.
Xabi Alonso's team was defeated by Roma in both games at the same round of the competition last season. However, they are now heading towards a treble as they prepare to face Kaiserslautern in the finals of the German Cup later this month. Roma had an impressive record since their head coach, Daniele De Rossi, took over from Jose Mourinho in January, losing just three games across all competitions. Unfortunately, they lost in the final to Sevilla on penalties in the previous year.
However, Leverkusen got lucky and managed to score a goal in the 28th minute after Roma's forward Romelu Lukaku's header hit the crossbar. De Rossi's team was not able to prevent the goal from happening.
During the match, the right-back for Roma, Rick Karsdorp, made a mistake with his pass. The ball didn't go far enough and allowed Alex Grimaldo from Bayer Leverkusen to pass it to Florian Wirtz. He used his foot to tap it into the net, marking his 18th goal this season for the German team. In the 73rd minute, Leverkusen showed their dominance when Christopher Andrich took a shot from 25 yards away that went beyond Roma's goalkeeper Mile Svilar.
Emotions got the best of Roma following Andrich's goal as there was verbal confrontations and a scuffle between players on both teams. This led to Spinazzola and Xhaka being given yellow cards. Roma didn't perform as well as their opponents, but they still had other opportunities to score.
During the second half of the game, Bryan Cristante came close to scoring but unfortunately missed the opportunity while Piero Hincapie made an excellent tackle to stop substitute Sardar Azmoun from scoring. Near the end of the game, replacement player Tammy Abraham had a chance to score but disappointingly headed the ball over the goal from only two yards away.
Before their second leg match against Roma next Thursday, Leverkusen has the chance to match Benfica's unbeaten record of 48 games in Europe's top 10 leagues. Benfica held this record between 1963 and 1965.
The first leg of the semi-final match between Olympique Marseille and Atalanta ended in a draw at the Orange Velodrome. Gianluca Scamacca scored an early goal for the Italian team, but Chancel Mbemba managed to equalize before half-time.
During the Europa Conference League, the team of Olympiacos caused a major upset by beating Aston Villa 4-2 in an away game at Villa Park. Ayoub El Kaabi stood out by scoring three goals, also known as a hat-trick.
The footballer from Morocco propelled Olympiacos to a 2-0 advantage, but then Ollie Watkins scored one goal for Villa just before the first half ended.
In the beginning of the second half, Moussa Diaby scored to bring Villa back to a tied game. However, El Kaabi made a successful penalty kick after Douglas Luiz touched the ball with his hand, and Santiago Hezze increased the visitors' lead by two goals.
In the other semi-final match, Fiorentina managed to secure a 3-2 lead over Club Brugge with a last-minute goal by M'Bala Nzola. Club Brugge had to play with one less player for 30 minutes after Raphael Onyedika received his second yellow card.
