After making contrasting starts to their Europa League league-phase campaigns last week, PAOK and FCSB will square off in the second round of fixtures on Thursday.

The hosts started with a trip to Galatasaray last time out and left empty-handed, while their visitors got off the mark with a convincing victory at home to Rigas Futbola Skola.

Match preview

PAOK return to action on Thursday aiming to record their first Europa League points of the campaign, after enduring a losing start to the league phase last week.

After winning their fourth Greek Super League title last time around, the White-Blacks began on the continent this season in the second round of Champions League qualifying, and they initially got past Borac Banja Luka only to exit in agonising fashion at the hands of Malmo in the following round, eventually losing 6-5 on aggregate after extra time.

That left Razvan Lucescu's side to fight for a spot in the inaugural Europa League league phase, and they cruised past Shamrock Rovers in the playoff round to progress, picking up a 6-0 aggregate victory in August, only to fall short in their main-competition opener.

The Greek champions faced a tough trip to Turkey to take on Galatasaray last week and left empty-handed, eventually succumbing to a 3-1 defeat despite drawing level through Giannis Konstantelias in the 67th minute, as Yunus Akgun quickly restored the hosts' lead before Mauro Icardi put the game out of sight in injury time.

Having failed to bounce back from that defeat at the weekend, hosting Aris and suffering a 1-0 defeat to drop to third spot after six games of their Super League defence, PAOK will now be desperate to put their first league-phase points on the board in the second round of fixtures on Thursday.

In their way stand a visiting side who will bid to continue a perfect start to their league-phase run after marking their return to a main European competition with a home victory last week.

After regaining the Romanian SuperLiga title for the first time since 2015 last time around, FCSB began their continental campaign in the first round of Champions League qualifying, and after cruising past Virtus and scraping past Maccabi Tel Aviv, their run towards Europe's top competition was ended in a 4-3 aggregate defeat to Sparta Prague.

The Roș-albaștrii were then able to book a league-phase place in the Europa League, though, picking up a 2-1 victory over Austrian outfit LASK over two legs thanks to a 1-1 draw on the road and a 1-0 home victory, before they met Rigas Futbola Skola in the curtain-raiser last week and took all three points in a 4-1 triumph courtesy of goals from Daniel Birligea and Marius Stefanescu and Darius Olaru's second-half brace.

Then returning to what has been a disappointing start to their top-flight title defence, Elias Charalambous's side were able to make it back-to-back wins on Sunday, beating Sepsi 1-0 on the road on Sunday courtesy of Florin Tanase's early goal to move up to ninth spot on 13 points from their first 10 outings.

FCSB will now turn their focus back to the continent and bid to make it three victories on the bounce and two wins from two league-phase matches on Thursday to strengthen their position at the table begins to take shape ahead of the knockout stage.

Team News

PAOK should field a similar starting XI on Thursday to last week's league-phase opener against Galatasaray, although defender Omar Colley is unlikely to feature having missed the weekend's meeting with Aris, while Brandon Thomas, Ally Samatta and Rafa Soares will continue to miss out.

Tomasz Kedziora and Giannis Michailidis could continue their partnership at the back in Colley's absence, although former Liverpool man Dejan Lovren will compete to come in from the outset, while Tiemoue Bakayoko, Stefan Schwab, Magomed Ozdoev and Mady Camara will compete for midfield spots.

At the top end of the pitch, Fedor Chalov should return from the outset to lead the line with support from wingers Andrija Zivkovic and Taison, with the wide men having produced combined tallies of 15 goals and 18 assists in their triumphant 2023-24 Greek Super League campaign.

Elias Charalambous should field an unchanged FCSB starting XI from last week's 4-1 win over Rigas Futbola Skola in their first league-phase outing, with Darius Olaru bound to play a key role in the attacking unit having moved onto 10 goals for the season with a brace in that triumph.

Daniel Birligea, who netted his first goal for the club to open the scoring in that game, should also come back in to lead the line, while Marius Stefanescu and David Miculescu will fight to return on the wings having been dropped to the bench for Sunday's trip to Sepsi.

Mihai Lixandru and Malcom Edjouma also had to settle for substitute appearances against Sepsi and will bid to regain their midfield spots from Adrian Sut and Baba Alhassan, while Joyskim Dawa and former Tottenham Hotspur and Napoli man Vlad Chiriches will continue their centre-back partnership.

PAOK possible starting lineup:
Kotarski; Otto, Kedziora, Lovren, Rahman; Ozdoev, Bakayoko; Zivkovic, Konstantelias, Taison; Chalov

FCSB possible starting lineup:
Tarnovanu; Popescu, Dawa, Chiriches, Radunovic; Lixandru, Edjouma; Stefanescu, Olaru, Miculescu; Birligea

We say: PAOK 2-0 FCSB

Despite the teams' contrasting results in the first round of fixtures in the Europa League league phase, PAOK boast more quality and continental experience in their ranks than the visitors and should have enough to open their account with home advantage on Thursday.


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