Udinese's 2-0 victory over defending champions Zenit St Petersburg gave Italy rare cause to celebrate and Manchester City are set to reach the UEFA Cup quarter-finals following Thursday's action.
Antonio Di Natale scored for Udinese in the seventh minute of injury-time following Fabio Quagliarella's 85th minute opener against Zenit St Petersburg to give Italy some joy as their sole representatives in Europe following their Champions League wipe-out before the quarter-finals for the first time in seven years.
Manchester City put one foot in the last eight with a 2-0 win over Danish side Aalborg at Eastlands. Brazil forward Robinho returned after missing City’s win over Aston Villa last week following a trip home to Brazil for treatment on an ankle injury and on Thursday he was also named in Brazil’s squad for World Cup action.
PHOTO: AFP
Felipe Caicedo and Shaun Wright-Phillips bagged first-half goals for Mark Hughes' side to put them on course for a quarter-final spot in the second-tier European competition for the first time in 30 years. Stephen Ireland admitted Manchester City should have killed off Aalborg.
“We should have finished the game off here,” Ireland told ITV television. “When we go there next, we have to be clever and not concede too early and get on the back foot, but we've done well away from home in Europe this season.”
Asked if it was his best goal in City colors, England international Wright-Phillips said: “I’d just like to think so. It came to me and I cut inside and let loose, but like Stevie said the team performance was magnificent and we have to build on it.”
PHOTO: AP
Wright-Phillips appeared sporting a heavy icepack on his right ankle having come off four minutes from time, but insisted it was nothing to worry about.
“It’s just a bit of a sore ankle, but I’ll just have to get on with it,” he said.
It was an up-and-down night for French clubs with Paris Saint-Germain getting a goalless draw with Portugal's Braga, Saint Etienne losing 1-0 at Werder Bremen, though Marseille had an impressive 2-1 victory over Ajax.
PSG coach Paul Le Guen said he was happy with the outcome.
“I'm rather satisfied with the match, particularly the second half, but I don’t know if it will be enough to go through to the quarter-finals. We’ll see. I saw a lot of tapes of this team and they played similarly to the ones on the screen and I wasn't surprised,” Le Guen said.
Meanwhile at Hamburg, former Tottenham Hotspur coach Martin Jol said after the home 1-1 draw with Turkey’s Galatasaray: “In the first half, we hardly played any football, but after the break we created four or five chances.”
Galatasaray coach Buelent Kormaz said: “If you only end up passing the ball back and forth in your own half, nothing happens up front, but at least the result is OK. I congratulate my team about the result. We have now a small advantage to take back to Turkey. Our biggest advantage is our stadium with our fans. We will use this to our advantage.”
In other matches, CSKA Moscow beat Shakhtar Donetsk and Dynamo Kiev got a victory over Metalist Kharkiv, both 1-0.
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