As we move to the 4th round of matches in the 2019/20 Europa League group stage, we are getting closer to knowing which teams will participate in the knockout stages of the competition. This round of games sees the reverse fixtures of the previous round and in Group L that means Manchester United will play Partizan Belgrade at Old Trafford.
The match will take place on Thursday the 7th of November and the hosts know a win could see them qualify ahead of the final 2 matches in the group. Partizan Belgrade need to at least draw the game to give themselves a decent chance of finishing in the top two places.
Manchester United suffered a 1-0 defeat away to Bournemouth on the weekend which ended a run of 3 successive away matches in 3 different competitions. The loss at Bournemouth was their first in 5 games but Manchester United remain undefeated in the Europa League this season.
📝 A look at the options available to Ole for our #UEL clash with Partizan Belgrade...#MUFC— Manchester United (@ManUtd) November 5, 2019
📝 A look at the options available to Ole for our #UEL clash with Partizan Belgrade...#MUFC
The Red Devils have won 2 and drawn one of their 3 matches, beating Astana 1-0 at Old Trafford before being held to a 0-0 at AZ. Manchester United then made the trip to Belgrade to take on Partizan Belgrade and came away with a 1-0 victory.
Trends show Manchester United are undefeated in their last 14 Europa League games and each of their last 10 at home. They have won 8 of those 10 matches but have only managed to score more than one goal in one of their last 4 at Old Trafford.
Partizan Belgrade make the trip to Manchester Sitting in 3rd place in the group with 4 points to their name. That leaves them 3 points behind Manchester United and one point adrift of AZ. Partizan Belgrade have won one of their 3 Europa League group games this season and that win came away against Astana on the second match day.
They have won only one of their last 4 matches in the competition and that was the win at Astana. However, Partizan Belgrade have not been easy to defeat in the Europa League this season and have lost just one of their last 5 games. Trends show they are undefeated in 6 of their last 8 away Europa League matches but have failed to keep a clean sheet in 6 of their last 7 on the road.
Team news and Manchester United are definitely without Axel Tuanzebe, Eric Bailly, Nemanja Matic and Paul Pogba. They also have doubts over the fitness of Luke Shaw, Timothy Fosu-Mensah, Demetri Mitchell and Diogo Dalot.
Partizan Belgrade have just one doubt for this game and former Liverpool man Lazar Markovic is struggling with a groin injury.
Manchester United are the clear favourites to win this game but as they have found out in the Europa League this season, wins are not always easy to come by. Partizan Belgrade will make themselves difficult to breakdown and we could see a narrow 1-0 win for the hosts.