Sevilla's Europa League Run Part 2

Short as it is, this post will discuss about Sevilla's run during the Europa League's knockout stages en route to the final; in the span of the last 3 seasons, Sevilla has encountered a variety of teams across Europe from England to Ukraine. Still, one fact remains: there are 8 games en route to the final.

Knockout format

The beauty of the knockout stages in a contemporary football context is the away goal rule whereby if the scores are tied across two legs, the team with the higher number of away goals wins. If not, it boils down to the pressure penalty shootout.

While this is a descriptive post about the results and the comparison between home and away matches in Sevilla's participation of the Europa League in the 2013-14, 2014-15, and 2015-16 seasons, the results gathered may be indicative of the level of difficulty faced by Sevilla in each run-ins. Moreover, we're able to explore the home ground advantage of Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán Stadium in contributing to their journey of the Europa League triumphs.

Sevilla's knockout stages result

First, let's see the win-draw-lose ratio in the 8 knockout games en route to the final.

Considering that Sevilla faces an independent opponent each time (especially since there is no repeated games against the same team in the same season), the graph may point towards several implications across the 3 seasons:

2013-14:

-The toughest run-in; team incurred most losses (3 games)

2014-15

-Undisputedly best performances from Sevilla; most wins (7) and only a draw; Unbeaten in all games.

2015-16:

-Sandwiched between the last two seasons in terms of results; same number of wins as first triumph in 2013-14, most draws (2)

Home/ Away Influences

With that said, let's explore the difference in home and away results in each seasons.

Without a doubt, it is clear to see that Sevilla win most of the knockout games at home. For example, they have 3, 4, 3 wins in the 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16 season respectively. Even so, they also performed well in away games - nicking draws once in a while.

If home advantage is that important, then Sevilla's dominant strategies in a 2 leg knockout matches can be easily laid out:

1) If first leg is at home, take and carry the lead to second leg.

2) If first leg is away, try to secure a draw and not lose.

Testing of 'dominant strategies'

In this part, we'll explore and discuss the impact of the above-mentioned strategies on each season separately; also, there will be an additional graph illustrating the match transition to reflect the performance of the team.

Match transition

To explain the term 'match transition', it is fairly simple, First, every start of the match will be a draw indicated by (D); when there is a goal conceded or scored when the scores are tied, it will be indicated by a (L) and (W) respectively.

The shorter transition, it may have several implications: one of which is that the match is largely dominated by one team, or the team is good at hanging on to a lead.

2013 -14 season

In the 2013-14 season, Sevilla had a nerve-wrecking run since they have lost twice of their first leg matches in the knockout stages. Linking back to the proposed dominant strategies, other than the erratic round of 16 - Sevilla clawed back from a home loss in their second leg away game to force the game to a PK (which will be discussed more in depth in subsequent posts) - they have managed to either leverage on their away draw or defend their home win results in the first leg.

With regards to the match transition in these matches, Sevilla's performance can be labelled as either dominated or dominating. Other than the anomaly in the first leg draw at Maribor where they fought back from a goal to snatch a win only to lose the lead; in light of such erratic and unpredictable match transition, the match is one for the neutrals. In retrospect, this season is blessed with a touch of luck as they have won once on the away goal rule and a penalty shootout.

2014 -15 season

This is clearly the season with the most wins by Sevilla in the knockout stages; other than the draw in Russia against Zenit St Petersburg, they have won all other matches. While this flow of results or form guide may indicate that they are on a good run, their victories did not come easy as shown in the match transition.

Starting from the round of 32, Sevilla had a tough time defending a first leg home win against Borussia Monchengladbach despite taking the lead 3 times in the second leg; this may entail that they might not be good at defending away from home. This is also reflected in the round of 16 second leg match against their Spanish counterpart Villarreal.

In most of their home matches, they have easily secured a D-W pattern which imply a dominant performance at home.

2015 - 16 season

In the latest season, Sevilla's result performance is in line with the proposed dominant strategies; despite having two losses, they were all in the second leg - one of which forced a penalty shootout (Phew!).

Even so, the match transition in this season shows some vulnerability; for instance in the cases of their away victories, focusing on the semi-final second leg draw against Shakhtar Donetsk and the Quarterfinal first leg win against Athletic Bilbao, they had to claw back from a goal to win the 2 legged tie.

In short, it is clear that among the 3 seasons, their second triumph in the 2014-15 season was their best year; it also comes to no surprise that also did well in the league table (to reiterate, they have hovered from a range of 10th position to 2nd pace throughout the season). In terms of vulnerability, their first Europa League win run-in was the toughest considering Sevilla had to go through based on an away goal rule and a penalty shootout. Their performance in the latest season is rather sandwiched between the first and second triumphs. However in most ties, Sevilla has adhered the proposed dominant strategies with a clear home advantage through the 3 seasons.

For now, I guess I will end it here.

In the next post, I will narrow in more on the home advantage in terms of goals scored, conceded and the timing of goals to illustrate the home advantage of Sevilla in their path to the Europa League crown.