Impressive unbeaten runs meet at Eden
Two teams hoping for extending their impressive unbeaten runs meet at Eden for the first leg of the UEFA Europa League Round of 16. Rangers have played 32 games in the Scottish Premiership this season winning 28 and drawing 4, Slavia have a record of 18 wins and 4 draws from their 22 league games during 2020/21 season.
Slavia are currently on top of the Czech Fortuna Liga table 11 points ahead of Sparta Prague (who played one game less), Rangers have already secured their first Scottish title in 10 years as they are currently 20 points ahead of Celtic with 6 games left.
Rangers lost their last game on 16 December 2020 (2-3 against St. Mirren in the Scottish League Cup) and have been 17 games unbeaten since. The Gers’ unbeaten run now consists of 33 league games and they are only 5 games from matching their all-time record of 38 games unbeaten in a top league which was set 92 years ago.
On the other side, Slavia have been 34 games unbeaten in the Czech league, last time Jindřich Trpišovský’s men lost to Slovácko on 1 March 2020. Slavia are now just 2 games from their league record. They managed to get 36 games unbeaten between 2016/17 and 2017/18 seasons.
Home at Eden the Red-whites have been unbeaten in the league for almost 31 months, since the 0-2 defeat to Jablonec on 18 August 2018 they haven’t lost in 44 games winning 38 of them. Throughout all competitions Slavia lost their last game on 10 December 2020 (0-4 away at Bayer Leverkusen) and their last home defeat dates to November 2019 (1-3 to Inter Milan in the UEFA Champions League Group Stage).
Which brings us to Rangers’ European campaign this season. They are 11 games unbeaten in the UEFA Europa League this season including 3 wins in the qualifying stage, 4 wins and 2 draws in the Group Stage and a crazy tie against Royal Antwerp in the Round of 32 in which overall 14 goals were scored (Rangers won 4-3 away and 5-2 home).
Slavia entered the Group Stage of the Europa League after a failed attempt to re-enter the Champions League (0-0 home and 1-4 away against FC Midtjylland) and started with a 1-3 away defeat to Hapoel Be’er Sheva, but with 4 wins out of the next 4 games the Red-whites secured their progress into the knockout stage despite the final loss at Leverkusen. In the Round of 32 Slavia were drawn against Leicester City FC and the tie was exactly the opposite of the Rangers-Antwerp battle. After a goalless home draw, Slavia won 2-0 at Leicester thanks to goals by Provod and Sima and progressed to the Round of 16 for the second time in last 3 seasons.
The 1st leg of the UEL Round of 16 between Slavia and Rangers will be played at Eden Arena in Prague on Thursday, 11 March, with kick-off at 6:55 pm CET.
