Dynamo Kiev and AEK Larnaca will look to pick up the first points of this season's Europa League when the two clubs face off on Thursday.

The Ukrainian side lost 2-1 to Fenerbahce on matchday one, while Larnaca were beaten 2-1 at home to Rennes last week.

Match preview

Dynamo Kiev will be playing their European home matches in Krakow due to Russia's ongoing military invasion of Ukraine.

Despite playing outside of Ukraine, the designated hosts will hope that they can claim a positive result after losing to Fenerbahce last week.

The Ukrainian side would have felt that they had done enough to earn a point, with Viktor Tsygankov cancelling out Gustavo Henrique's opener, but a 92nd-minute winner from Michy Batshuayi condemned Dynamo Kiev to a fifth consecutive defeat in all competitions.

Following their poor run of form, Dynamo Kiev received a boost at the weekend, beating Lviv 1-0 to claim their first league win of the season.

Mircea Lucescu's side will now look to end a run of three straight defeats in the Europa League as they bid to get their European campaign up and running.

Like their hosts, Larnaca were also on the wrong side of a stoppage-time winner last week, resulting in a 2-1 home defeat to Rennes.

Oier levelled for the Cypriot side after Arthur Theate had opened the scoring, but Larnaca were unable to hold onto the point, with Lorenz Assignon netting a 94th-minute winner.

They were at least able to respond with a win at the weekend as they edged out Nea Salamis 1-0 to claim their first league win of the season at the third time of asking.

Jose Luis Oltra will hope the narrow victory adds impetus to Larnaca's European and domestic campaign ahead of games against Dynamo Kiev and Pafos.

The visitors will be hoping to draw confidence from the fact that they have already beaten Ukrainian opposition this season with a victory in both legs of the Europa League qualifying tie against Dnipro-1.

Team News

Volodymyr Kostevych, Mykola Shaparenko and Vladyslav Supryaga are all expected to miss out for Dynamo Kiev due to injury issues.

Kostyantyn Vivcharenko and Volodymyr Shepelev are set to retain their places in the starting lineup after coming into the side for the weekend win over Lviv.

Meanwhile, Vitaliy Buyalskyi will look to add to the three goals that he has scored this season when he leads the line on Thursday.

As for the visitors, they are unable to call upon Andreas Paraskevas and Bruno Gama who are both sidelined through injury.

After being rested at the weekend, Nenad Tomovic is expected to return to partner Hrvoje Milicevic in central defence, while Ismael Casas and Angel Garcia are set to operate as full-backs.

Victor Olatunji will feature up front for Larnaca, with the forward looking to add to his two-goal tally for the season.

Dynamo Kiev possible starting lineup:
Bushchan; Kedziora, Burda, Syrota, Vivcharenko; Shepelev, Sydorchuk; Tsygankov, Garmash, Kabaev, Buyalskyi

AEK Larnaca possible starting lineup:
Piric; Casas, Milicevic, Tomovic, Garcia, Sanjurjo, Gustavo; Faraj, Trickovski, Altman; Olatunji

We say: Dynamo Kiev 1-1 AEK Larnaca

Both sides lost narrowly on matchday one, and we believe they will be involved in a closely-fought contest, which we think could result in a draw with both sides looking to avoid beginning the group stage with consecutive defeats.

For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.

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