Partizan will be aiming to maintain their place at the top of Group D when they host FC Koln in the Europa Conference League on Thursday.

The visitors suffered a shock defeat to the Serbian SuperLiga runners-up last week in Cologne.

Match preview

Indeed, Gordan Petric's side produced a serious backs-against-the-wall performance against Koln last time out in Europe, with Svetozar Markovic's ninth-minute strike giving them something to cling onto for the rest of the game.

The Germans had 74% possession and 17 shots across the course of the match but failed to break their opponents down, with goalkeeper Aleksandar Popovic making five saves to keep his side ahead.

Petric's side always retained a threat in transition, though, having 10 shots themselves despite taking such an early lead against their more fancied opponents.

Since taking over the side that he made 106 league appearances for during his playing career in early August, Petric can seemingly do very little wrong with Partizan, having remained unbeaten after 90 minutes in all 14 of his matches in all competitions.

The only blot on his copybook so far was a penalty-shootout defeat to second tier outfit FK Radnicki Sremska Mitrovica in the first round of the Serbian Cup, when his players somehow managed to miss all four of their penalties.

Twenty-two points from a possible 24 in an unbeaten run of eight league games has moved them to within five points of their fiercest rivals Red Star Belgrade in their domestic division, though, while if they can beat Koln on Thursday they will move within two points of securing their progression to the Europa Conference League knockout stages for the second successive season.

Koln, meanwhile, are struggling to find any real consistency in Steffen Baumgart's second season in charge, having made a mixed start to their domestic and European seasons.

A 5-2 thrashing at the hands of Borussia Monchengladbach at the weekend saw them drop to ninth in the Bundesliga table with 13 points from nine matches, while last week's defeat at home to Partizan leaves them chasing the Serbs and Nice in Group D.

However, they are only one point behind the top two, meaning if they can inflict revenge in Belgrade on Thursday, they could even jump back into top spot ahead of their final two matches.

Baumgart and his players will fancy their chances of beating Czech Republic outfit FC Slovacko next week, making their head-to-heads with Partizan and Nice ultra important if they are to advance beyond the group stages of European competition for the first time since the turn of the century.

Team News

Partizan are likely to be without central midfielder Ljubomir Fejsa due to a knock, while Marko Brnovic was not registered in their Europa Conference League squad and is therefore unable to feature.

Petric is unlikely to make any changes to the starting XI that caused an upset in Cologne last week, with his side shaping up in a well-drilled 4-4-2 formation designed to catch teams on the break.

Baumgart may have that in mind having named an attacking lineup against Partizan last week, with Ellyes Skhiri likely to anchor the midfield alongside Eric Martel.

Florian Kainz was sent off during the weekend's defeat to Gladbach and may therefore start given his unavailability against Augsburg on Sunday, but club captain Jonas Hector could be handed a rest.

Timo Horn, Julian Chabot, Dejan Ljubicic, Mathias Olesen, Jan Thielmann, Dimitrios Limnios, Sebastian Andersson and Tim Lemperle are all expected to be sidelined through injury, severely restricting Baumgart's ability to rotate as much as he may like in this competition.

Partizan possible starting lineup:
Popovic; Filipovic, Markovic, Vujacic, Urosevic; Diabate, Natkho, Traore, Menig; Pavlovic, Gomes

FC Koln possible starting lineup:
Schwabe; Schindler, Kilian, Soldo, Pedersen; Skhiri, Martel; Adamyan, Uth, Kainz; Dietz

We say: Partizan 1-1 FC Koln

Koln will have learned from their defeat to Partizan last week, but we can envisage the Serbs gaining another positive result.

Neither team is likely to be too disappointed with a share of the spoils, with a draw seeming to be the most likely outcome on Thursday.

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

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