Comments and predictions for AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray: Lucky for the away team
The match between AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray in the Europa League takes place at 0:45 on February 14. Nghe An Newspaper analyzes performance, football commentary and predicts the score.
Latest AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray squad information
AZ Alkmaar duo Ruben van Bommel and Ibrahim Sadiq are still out through injury. Kristijan Belic will also miss Thursday's game due to his yellow card tally (his third in Matchday 8).
With Belic suspended, Jordy Clasie or Kees Smit (who scored against Galatasaray earlier this season) could partner Peer Koopmeiners in midfield, while Sven Mijnans, who scored twice against Ferencvaros, is expected to continue in the 'number 10' role.
Troy Parrott is AZ Alkmaar's top scorer this season with 16 goals in all competitions, including two in his last two Europa League games. He is likely to continue as a centre-forward. Support for Parrott will come from wingers Jayden Addai and Mayckel Lahdo.
On Galatasaray's side, Mauro Icardi, Yunus Akgun and Ismail Jakobs (due to injury) are absent. Meanwhile, Victor Osimhen, Davinson Sanchez and Lucas Torreira will not be able to play in the first leg due to accumulating enough yellow cards.
Two new signings, Morata and Carlos Cuesta, have been added to the Europa League squad. Both are ready to play in the upcoming match. However, some other new players such as Ahmed Kutucu, Mario Lemina and Przemyslaw Frankowski are not on the registration list.
Midfielder Berkan Kutlu will likely continue to play out of position, either at left-back or left wing-back. In addition, Kerem Demirbay is likely to be trusted by the coach and partner Gabriel Sara in central midfield.
Latest expected lineup AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray
AZ Alkmaar:
Owusu-Oduro; Kasius, Goes, Penetra, Wolfe; Clasie, Koopmeiners; Addai, Mijnans, Lahdo; Parrott
Galatasaray:
Muslera; Ayhan, Cuesta, Bardakci, Kutlu; Sara, Demirbay; Sallai, Mertens, Yilmaz; Morata
Latest football commentary AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray
AZ Alkmaar have reached the knockout stages of the European Cup after a five-year wait. The Dutch side are also aiming to qualify for the Europa League play-offs (something they haven't done since 2013/14). After the League Phase, AZ have accumulated enough points to avoid elimination.
Despite losing 3-4 to Ferencvaros in mid-February, AZ Alkmaar finished the group stage with 11 points from 8 games. This result (3 wins, 2 draws and 3 losses) was enough to secure a place in the play-off round (just 1 point ahead of the team below).
The cheesemakers then won three consecutive domestic matches, including a 3-1 win over Quick Boys in the KNVB Beker quarter-finals and two 2-0 wins over Willem II and PEC Zwolle in the Eredivisie.
Under Maarten Martens, AZ have climbed to fourth place in the Eredivisie, opening up a chance to qualify for the Champions League. They will now face Galatasaray - the opponents they drew 1-1 with in the fifth matchday (League Phase) last November.
AZ head into Thursday’s game in impressive home form, having lost just two of their last 35 games in all competitions (W23 D10). However, in the knockout stages of European competition, they have lost three of their last seven home games (W2 D2).
Galatasaray (after being eliminated by Slavia Prague in the Europa League play-off round last season) have made it to the same stage this season, with 13 points from 8 League Phase matches (3 wins, 4 draws and 1 loss).
The Turkish giants have missed out on a direct passage to the round of 16. A 2-1 defeat to Ajax two weeks ago left Galatasaray in 14th place out of 36 teams in the League Phase (just one point behind the top eight).
After that, coach Okan Buruk's team went through 3 matches in the domestic arena: beating Gaziantep 1-0 in the Super Lig and beating Boluspor 4-1 in the National Cup. However, the match against Adana Demirspor last weekend was strangely postponed when the entire Adana squad walked off the field to protest the penalty awarded to Galatasaray.
Putting aside the recent incident, Galatasaray will try to find an advantage against AZ next Thursday. The Turkish representative is the team that scored the most goals in the League Phase (19 goals, 2 more than the leader Lazio). However, Galatasaray has never won in the last 6 away trips to the Netherlands, including 2 matches in this year's season.
Latest AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray score prediction
Based on the above football comments, we and the world's leading football sites have given the results of the match.AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasarayas follows:
- Sportsmole:AZ Alkmaar 2-2 Galatasaray
- WhoScore:AZ Alkmaar 1-1 Galatasaray
- Our newspaper predicts:AZ Alkmaar 2-2 Galatasaray
When and where to watch AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray live?
To watch live the match AZ Alkmaar vs Galatasaray in the Europa League taking place at 0:45 on February 14, viewers can watch onK+ Sport,K+PMor online sports channels. Wish you have fun watching football.
