2008–09 UEFA Cup

The UEFA Cup 2008–09 was the 38th edition of the UEFA Cup football tournament. The final was played at the Şükrü Saracoğlu Stadium, home ground of Fenerbahçe, in Istanbul, Turkey, on 20 May 2009.^[1] This season was the final one to use the UEFA Cup format; starting in 2009, the event is known as the UEFA Europa League.

Zenit St. Petersburg were the defending champions, but were eliminated by Udinese in the Round of 16.

Qualification

119 teams qualified directly for the 2008–09 UEFA Cup from 53 UEFA associations. An additional three teams qualified via the UEFA Fair Play league, while 35 further teams will qualify from the UEFA Intertoto Cup and the UEFA Champions League. Each association enters a certain number of teams to the UEFA Cup based on its league coefficient. Through domestic competitions (national championships and cups and league cups in certain countries) an association may qualify up to four teams. Below is the qualification scheme for the 2008–09 UEFA Cup:

• Associations 1–6 each have 3 teams qualify
• Associations 7–8 each have 4 teams qualify
• Associations 9–15 each have 2 teams qualify
• Associations 16–21 each have 3 teams qualify
• Associations 22–53 each have 2 teams qualify, with the exception of Liechtenstein (38), Andorra (51) and San Marino (52) who have 1 team

plus

• 3 UEFA Fair Play entries
• 11 winners of the UEFA Intertoto Cup 2008
• 16 losers from the UEFA Champions League third qualifying round
• 8 third-placed teams from the UEFA Champions League group stage

• ^1 UEFA Champions League group stage third-placed team of each group
• ^2 Losers of UEFA Champions League third qualifying round
• ^3 Moved up from the lower qualifying round due to the Title Holder entry not being used.
• ^4 Third round winners of UEFA Intertoto Cup

Round and draw dates

The calendar shows the dates of the rounds and draw.

Qualifying rounds

First qualifying round

The draw for the first qualifying round took place on 1 July 2008.^[10] The first legs were played on 17 July 2008 and the second legs were played on 31 July 2008, with the exception of the Nordsjælland vs TVMK match, which was played on 29 July 2008.

• ^5 Played in Smederevo at Fortress Stadium as Borac Čačak's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^6 Played in Berlin at Friedrich Ludwig Jahn Sportpark because Olympiastadion was occupied by another event.^[11]
• ^7 Played in Chişinău at Zimbru Stadium as Nistru Otaci's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^8 Played at Tórsvøllur as EB/Streymur's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^9 Manchester City played their home game at Oakwell Stadium, home of Barnsley, because the pitch at their home ground needed to be relaid after a Bon Jovi concert.^[12]
• ^10 Played at Råsunda Stadium as Djurgården's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^11 Midtjylland were originally drawn to play at home in the first leg, but the order of the games was reversed.
• ^12 Bangor City's home leg was played at Wrexham's Racecourse Ground, as their own ground did not meet UEFA criteria.

In each region of the draw for the first qualifying round, teams were divided into two pots, on the basis of UEFA coefficients. The lower pots contained unranked teams from associations 34–53, together with Vėtra of Lithuania (the 33rd association). The higher pots contained teams from associations 1–32, together with Sūduva of Lithuania, and FH (who had a team ranking, 209).

Three of the 37 ties were won by the lower ranked team, all involving teams whose ranking was that of their association: WIT Georgia (Georgia, ranked 38) beat Spartak Trnava (Slovakia, 24); Vllaznia Shkodër (Albania, 43) beat Koper (Slovenia, 29); and St Patrick's Athletic (Ireland, 35) beat Olimps (Latvia, 31).

Second qualifying round

The draw for the second qualifying round was held on 1 August 2008 in Nyon, Switzerland,^[13] and featured 16 teams entering directly at the second qualifying round, as well as the 37 winners from the previous round and the 11 third round winners of the UEFA Intertoto Cup. The first legs were played on 14 August 2008 and the second leg on 28 August 2008.

Because there are an odd number of teams in the Central and Northern groups in the 2nd qualifying round, UEFA moved Rennes from the Central-East group to the Northern group. Furthermore Liepājas Metalurgs and Sūduva were moved from the Northern group to the Central-East group, and Vaslui and Interblock Ljubljana were moved from the Southern-Mediterranean group to the Central-East group. It is unknown why UEFA decided on these last moves since it is not strictly required. One of the reasons could be to have more balance in the groups with respect to the coefficients.

• ^13 Played at Fortress Stadium in Smederevo as Borac Čačak's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^14 Order of legs reversed due to APOEL playing the same day at Omonia's stadium
• ^15 The return leg was played in AFG Arena, St. Gallen as Grasshoppers' home ground, the Letzigrund is occupied by a Golden League athletics meet the following day.^[14]
• ^16 Due to the current conflict in Georgia and the ensuing safety concerns, UEFA ordered the first leg to be cancelled. The match was held as a single leg tie in Vienna.^[15]
• ^17 Played at Stadio Cornaredo in Lugano as Stadio Comunale in Bellinzona did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^18 Played at Petrol Arena in Celje as Interblock's home ground in Ljubljana did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^19 Played at Friedrich Ludwig Jahn Sportpark because Hertha BSC's usual home ground, Olympiastadion, was occupied with a Madonna concert.
• ^20 Played at Råsunda Stadium as Djurgården's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.
• ^21 Order of legs reversed at the request of both clubs.^[16]

In each region of the draw for the second qualifying round, teams were divided into two pots, on the basis of UEFA coefficients. The higher pots contained teams with a ranking of 176 or higher, and unranked teams from associations ranked 1 to 15 (or 17 in the Southern-Mediterranean region).

12 of the 32 ties were won by the lower-ranked team. The 12 teams that lost to a lower team were: AEK Athens, Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, Aris Thessaloniki, Red Star Belgrade, Grasshopper, Slovan Liberec, Viking, Lokomotiv Sofia, Elfsborg, Gent, Queen of the South and Debrecen. St Patrick's Athletic were the only team to beat a higher-seeded team in each of the two qualifying rounds.

First round

32 teams entered the tournament at the first round, along with the 32 winners from the previous round and the 16 losers from the Champions League third qualifying round. The 80 teams were then split into eight groups of 10 teams; five seeded teams and five unseeded teams. The draw was based on their coefficient ranking with one exception: no country can have multiple teams in any group. Teams ranked 108 or higher were seeded, as were unranked teams from England and Spain.

The draw, which was conducted by UEFA General Secretary David Taylor, was held on Friday, 29 August 2008 at 13:00 CET in Monaco. The matches were played on 18 September and 2 October 2008.

• ^22 Order of legs reversed.
• ^23 Order of legs reversed due to AC Omonia's ground-share fixture congestion.
• ^24 Played at Alvalade XXI, since Vitória FC's homeground at Setúbal does not meet UEFA criteria
• ^25 Order of legs reversed due to Spartak Moscow playing the same day in Moscow.
• ^26 Played at Borås Arena as Kalmar FF's home ground did not meet UEFA criteria.

Nine of the 40 ties were won by the unseeded team. The nine seeded losing teams, with their ranking, were: Everton (50), Rapid Bucureşti (58), Beşiktaş (60), Sparta Prague (68), Dinamo Bucureşti (69), Levski Sofia (80), Austria Wien (82), Rennes (97) and Hapoel Tel Aviv (108).

Group stage

The draw for the group stage of the 2008–09 UEFA Cup was held at UEFA Headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, on 7 October 2008. The 40 teams in the draw were divided into five pots based on their UEFA coefficients. The eight teams with the highest UEFA coefficient were allocated to Pot 1, the next eight teams to Pot 2, and so on. One team from each pot was drawn for each group, with the restriction that no team could be drawn with one from the same country.^[17]

The top three teams (highlighted in green) of each group qualified for the next round. Based on paragraph 6.06 in the UEFA regulations for the current season, if two or more teams are equal on points on completion of the group matches, the following criteria are applied to determine the rankings:

1. superior goal difference from all group matches played;
2. higher number of goals scored;
3. higher number of goals scored away;
4. higher number of wins;
5. higher number of away wins;
6. higher number of coefficient points accumulated by the club in question, as well as its association, over the previous five seasons.

Final phase

All of the rounds in the final phase are two-legged, except for the final. In the event of aggregate scores being equal after normal time in the second leg, the winning team will be that which scored more goals on their away leg: if the scores in the two matches were identical, extra time is played. The away goals rule also applies if scores are equal at the end of extra time. If there are no goals scored in extra time, the tie is decided on a penalty shoot out. The team first out of the hat in each tie plays the first leg of their tie at home, and the second leg away.

The draw for the Round of 32 was both held on Friday, 19 December 2008 in Nyon, Switzerland. The draw was conducted by UEFA General Secretary David Taylor, Giorgio Marchetti, UEFA's director of professional football and 2009 UEFA Cup Final ambassador Can Bartu. In this round, each UEFA Cup group winner paired with the third-placed team from another UEFA Cup group and each UEFA Cup group runner-up paired with a third-placed team from the UEFA Champions League, with the only restriction on the draw being that teams from the same national association could not be drawn together. The UEFA Cup group winners and runners-up each played the second leg of their Round of 32 ties at home.^[18]

The draw for the Round of 16 also took place on 19 December 2008, immediately after the draw for the Round of 32. Each tie in the Round of 32 was numbered and teams were drawn for the Round of 16 as "Winners of match 1", "Winners of match 2", etc. Unlike the Round of 32, teams from the same group or country may be drawn together from the Round of 16 onwards, meaning that they were entirely random draw.

The draws for the quarter-finals and semi-finals were both held on Friday, 20 March 2009 in Nyon, Switzerland. The draw was conducted by David Taylor and Can Bartu.

Bracket

Round of 32

The first legs were played on 18 February and 19 February, while the second leg matches were played on 26 February 2009.

Manchester City were the only team from the first qualifying round to reach the Round of 16. Braga were the only team from the Intertoto Cup to reach the Round of 16 and were therefore awarded the title of Intertoto Cup winners.

Of the eight teams who had been placed in Pot 5 of the group stage draw, only Metalist Kharkiv and Saint-Étienne reached the Round of 16. Of the eight teams that entered the Round of the 32 from the UEFA Champions League group stage, two lost: Fiorentina and Bordeaux. Of the eight ties between a third-placed team and a first-placed team from the UEFA Cup group stage, two were won by the third-placed team; the winners were Braga and Paris Saint-Germain.

Round of 16

The first leg matches were played on 12 March, while the second leg matches were played on 18 March and 19 March 2009.

Quarter-finals

The first legs were played on 9 April and the second legs were played on 16 April.

Semi-finals

The first legs were played on 30 April and the second legs on 7 May.

Final

The final of the UEFA Cup 2008–09 was held on 20 May 2009 at the Şükrü Saracoğlu Stadium in Istanbul, Turkey. This was the first time that the UEFA Cup Final had been held in Turkey and followed the 2005 UEFA Champions League Final, which was held in Istanbul's Atatürk Olympic Stadium.

Top goalscorers

Source: Hammond, Mike, ed (2009). The European Football Yearbook 2009/10. London: Carlton Books. ISBN 978-1-84732-360-6.

See also

• 2008–09 UEFA Champions League
• 2008 UEFA Intertoto Cup
• 2009 UEFA Super Cup

References

External links

• 2008/09 UEFA Cup - results and line-ups