Aberdeen FC Travels To Georgia For Europa League Qualifier Against Chikhura

The lengthy and complex process of qualification for the UEFA Champions League took center stage in the soccer world earlier this week and now the same process continues for the UEFA Europa League. In fact, the Europa League qualification process is even more difficult to follow than the Champions League due to the greater number of teams involved. The Europa League qualification includes 178 teams that are competing for one of 21 spots in the competition’s group stage. These teams will join 17 teams that have secured spots in group play already along with a number of teams eliminated from Champions League competition.

Overall, there are 213 teams from all 55 UEFA member associations that participate in the Europa League competition. Eventually, the various avenues for qualification will produce 48 teams that will advance to the Europa League Group Stage. 24 teams will advance from this round to the Knockout rounds and just to make it all the more confusing 8 third place teams from the Champions League group stage are added to the bracket at this stage of the tournament. This is a gross oversimplification of the qualification process–if you want more information on how it all works there’s a dedicated area of the UEFA website that (attempts) to explain it all.

The 31 games played on Thursday (and one on Wednesday) are the first leg in the second round of the qualification process. In this preview, we’ll head to Tbilisi, Georgia as Chikhura Sachkhere (usually just called ‘Chikhura’) from the Erovnuli Liga will host last season’s 4th place finisher in the Scottish Premiership, Aberdeen FC. Chikhura actually represents the city of Sachkhere but this game will be contested at the at the 54,549 seat Boris Paichadze Dinamo Arena as their usual home field is not up to Europa League standards.

As is the case with a number of second tier European Leagues there is a good deal of stratification in the standings. Last season, Celtic won the Premiership with 87 points, 9 better than second place Rangers. Kilmarnock and Aberdeen finished 20 points behind Celtic with the final standing position determined by goal differential. The result is that Celtic heads into Champions League qualifying while Rangers, Kilmarnock and Aberdeen go into Europa League qualification.

It’s a fair assessment that Aberdeen is the significantly stronger side and they’ve done well in away games of late losing only two of their last 15 on the road. They have, however, lost 5 of their last 8 away games in European competition. Chikhura isn’t a world beater but they’ve gone unbeaten in their last three Europa qualification games at home (or more appropriately their ‘temporary home’ in Tbilisi). Given the tough travel logistics necessary for the 3,000 mile trip the Aberdeen strategy for this game is obvious–don’t dig a hole. They’d be happy with any reasonable result in the away leg which would allow them to focus their energies on the home leg at Pittodrie on August 1. The Europa League Qualification odds look a bit too easy for this one. We’ll take the handicap with the home side at a plus money price.

BET CHIKHURA +1/2 +110 OVER ABERDEEN

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