Kemar Roofe’s winner on Thursday sent Rangers into the UEFA Europa League round-of-16 with a 3-2 victory at Real Betis Balompie, while Joao Pedro’s late strike helped Brighton & Hove Albion sink Olympique de Marseille.
Rangers, runners-up in the competition two seasons ago, were heading out of the tournament and into the UEFA Europa Conference League with the game level 12 minutes from time and Sparta Prague on their way to a 3-1 victory at Aris, but after a corner was not cleared twice, Roofe bundled the ball home from close range to fire Rangers from third to first in Group C.
The Scottish giants had twice led in the first half through Abdallah Sima and Cyriel Dessers, but Juan Miranda and Ayoze Perez equalized for Betis.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Rangers held on in a frantic finale to inflict a first home defeat of the season on Betis, who had to settle for a Conference League playoff spot.
“[Playing in Europe] is special, it’s always been special during my time here,” Roofe told TNT Sports.
Brighton avoided a Europa League knockout-round playoff in February with a tense 1-0 home win over Marseille in Group B.
Both teams had already secured top-two finishes, but the Seagulls needed a win to usurp Marseille at the top of the standings.
The English Premier League side struggled to break down their visitors for long periods, but Pedro showed neat footwork in the penalty area before drilling the ball into the top corner in the 88th minute to score his sixth goal in as many Europa League matches this season.
“I lost my voice, I lost everything. It was an amazing game. We played amazing football,” Brighton manager Roberto de Zerbi said.
West Ham United made it a clean sweep for British teams, finishing top of their group as Mohammed Kudus and Edson Alvarez scored in a 2-0 win over SC Freiburg, who finished second in Group A.
Earlier, a youthful Liverpool side lost 2-1 at Royale Union Saint-Gilloise in their final group game.
Liverpool manager Juergen Klopp rang the changes with his team already secure as Group E winners and with an eye on tomorrow’s English Premier League game against rivals Manchester United, starting six players aged 20 or younger.
Saint-Gilloise, who needed a victory to keep alive their hopes of pipping Toulouse to second place, took the lead through Mohamed Amoura before Jarell Quansah hit back for Liverpool.
Cameron Puertas restored the hosts’ advantage two minutes before halftime with a low strike that beat Caoimhin Kelleher at his near post.
Klopp threw on Joe Gomez, Ryan Gravenberch and Darwin Nunez in the second half, but Saint-Gilloise held on for a famous victory, although the Belgians dropped into the Europa Conference League playoff round after Toulouse beat LASK 2-1 in the group’s other game to finish second.
Dani Parejo scored a late winner as Villarreal took top spot in Group F and direct qualification for the round-of-16 with a 3-2 victory at Stade Rennais.
Lorenz Assignon scored in the 12th minute of stoppage-time to seemingly send Rennes back to the group summit, but his goal was ruled out by the video assistant referee (VAR) and scuffles broke out after the final whistle.
VAR intervened because Enzo Le Fee had collected the ball himself after his own free-kick had struck the woodwork in the buildup.
“I also learned [this rule] at that time to be very honest,” Rennes coach Julien Stephan said. “I knew it was the case from the penalty spot, but I didn’t think it could exist from a free-kick.”
The Ligue 1 club only needed to avoid defeat to finish first, but instead will have to face a team dropping out of the UEFA Champions League in the playoff.
Azeri club Qarabag finished second in Group H courtesy of a 2-1 success against BK Hacken.
They were a distant eight points adrift of group winners Bayer 04 Leverkusen, though, as the Bundesliga leaders extended their unbeaten start to the season to 23 matches in all competitions by thrashing Molde 5-1.
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Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei yesterday advanced to the semi-finals of the women’s doubles at the Australian Open, while Coco Gauff’s dreams of a first women’s singles title in Melbourne were crushed in the quarter-finals by Paula Badosa. World No. 2 Alexander Zverev was ruffled by a stray feather in his men’s singles quarter-final, but he refocused to beat 12th seed Tommy Paul and reach the semi-finals. Third seeds Hsieh and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia defeated Elena-Gabriela Ruse of Romania and Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine 6-2, 5-7, 7-5 in 2 hours, 20 minutes to advance the semi-finals. Hsieh and Ostapenko converted eight of 14 break
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