Champions League Play-offs: Fiorentina and Sporting set for a decider

Arsenal, Lyon and Stuttgart may already have one foot in the lucrative group phase of the Champions League with Atletico Madrid, who hold a useful 3-2 lead over Panathinaikos, but Fiorentina and Sporting Lisbon, level at 2-2 from the first leg in Portugal, have everything to play when they meet for the 2nd leg of the play-offs on Wednesday.

Both sides , who last won a European competition back in the early 1960s, are set for a decider when they meet in Florence.

Fourth in last season’s Italian championship, Fiorentina has struggled to keep pace with the traditional Serie A title contenders such as Juventus, Inter and AC Milan and last won the title in 1969. It was runner up in the old European Cup in 1957 and its only European triumph was in the 1961 Cup Winners Cup.

Sporting Club is an 18-time winner of the Portuguese league but its only European success was the 1964 Cup Winners Cup. Now these two underachievers have a chance to make a mark in European football’s most prestigious club competition but only one can get there.

The playoff losers have the consolation of dropping into the next round of the Europa League, while the winners will be in Thursday’s draw for the group phase in Monte Carlo.

Among those already there are the likes of defending champion Barcelona, big-spending Real Madrid, powerhouse English teams, Manchester United, Liverpool and Chelsea, Italy’s Inter Milan, Juventus and AC Milan and Bayern Munich of Germany, all of them among the favorites to win the coveted title.

Getting to the group phase, however, guarantees at least six matches with the ticket sales and TV revenue that comes with them, and with the tantalizing possibility of reaching the knockout phase and dreams of a place in the May 22 final in Madrid.

After beating Celtic 2-0 in Glasgow, Arsenal will be confident of reaching the group phase for the 12th time in a row.

Manager Arsene Wenger is already certain he won’t have team captain Cesc Fabregas for the return leg at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday because of a hamstring injury he picked up in Saturday’s 4-1 victory over Portsmouth.

Celtic’s 5-2 victory over St. Johnstone on Saturday lifted the team to the top of the Scottish Premier League standings and midfielder Shaun Maloney is confident the team can overcome the home leg deficit in the same way it knocked out Dynamo Moscow in the previous round.

“If we can nick the first goal as we did in Moscow, that would give us a chance to get the tie back, and start to put Arsenal under a bit of pressure,” Maloney said. “We know we need a great result.

“We’ve not given up the tie yet. We’ve not settled for playing in the Europa League, we cannot do that. “We know how difficult it is going to be to be able to go through and that the odds are massively against us, but we have to believe that we can win at the Emirates.”

Lyon goes to Anderlecht on Tuesday with a 5-1 advantage from the home leg but left behind striker Sidney Govou, midfielder Ederson and right-back Cleber Anderson who are injured. Rightback Francois Clerc is back while striker Lisandro Lopez, who was rested during Saturday’s 3-0 win at Auxerre, is expected to play in Brussels.

Atletico Madrid has home advantage and a narrow lead over Panathinaikos in a meeting of two clubs who have never won the competition but were runners up in the early 1970s.

Holding a 3-0 lead over Ventspils from the away leg in Latvia, FC Zurich looks like making it to the group phase for the first time, even though it reached the semifinal of the old European Cup in 1964 and ’77.

Likewise Maccabi Haifa holds a 2-1 advantage over Salzburg and has home advantage when they meet again on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, Stuttgart is at home to Romania’s Politehnica Timisoara and is already 2-0 ahead and Greek champion Olympiakos is 2-0 up on Sheriff Tiraspol of Moldova and just needs to avoid losing by more than 1-0 at home.

Apoel Nicosia bids to overcome a 1-0 deficit at home to FC Copenhagen.