By CALEB SONNELAND
Jozy Altidore should make his Europa League debut tonight as AZ Alkmaar lines up against Swedish outfit Malmo FF.
Altidore, currently on a hot streak with his new club, has five goals in six appearances and has been an immediate hit for the Dutch side since signing in mid-July.
AZ Alkmaar was drawn into Group H with Austrians FK Austria Wien, FC Metalist Kharkiv of the Ukraine and Malmo. Despite it being the first game of group play, AZ is tipped to progress from the group with ease.
AZ is currently enjoying a high-flying start to the Dutch Premier League with four wins, a lone loss and a +11 goal difference.
ATLETICO MADRID FACES CELTIC
In one of the more heavyweight clashes amidst the Europa League, La Liga's Atletico Madrid will line up against one half of Scotland's Old Firm in Celtic.
A group that many believe is a potential "group of death", the two sides were thrown into Group I with Udinese of Serie A and Rennes of Ligue 1.
Atletico is currently languishing in the 14th position of La Liga after undergoing a difficult start to its campaign within the league.
In contrast, Celtic has shot up the Scottish Premier League table to second place with 15 points behind its old-time rivals Rangers FC who has 16 points.
ENGLAND WELL REPRESENTED IN GROUP PLAY
The English Premier League will have plenty of representatives in this year's Europa League competition with Tottenham, Stoke, Birmingham City and Fulham all carrying the banner for the EPL.
Tottenham gained entry to the competition after finishing 5th in the EPL, four points ahead of Liverpool and six points behind Arsenal. It will kick off its campaign against Greeks PAOK Salonika.
Stoke was awarded its place when it reached the FA Cup Final and Manchester City achieved a UEFA Champions League spot. Dynamo Kiev will be its first contest in tonight's clash.
After winning the League Cup 2-1 over Arsenal, Birmingham was thrown into the pot for Europa, while Fulham will enjoy its second straight year in the competition after gaining entry via the Fair Play league. The two sides will face Braga and FC Twente, respectively.
AMERICANS IN ACTION
Altidore won't be the only one representing the United States tonight.
Brad Freidel could be between the sticks for Tottenham, and Steve Cherundolo will line up and captain Hannover as it faces Standard Liege.
Jermaine Jones, still contracted to Schalke 04, could face Steaua Bucuresti in Group J, while Clint Dempsey will assuredly be amongst Martin Jol's starting XI against FC Twente.
Sacha Kljestan has been a rock for Anderlecht recently and should find himself in its midfield to face AEK Athens, and Oguchi Onyewu could end up on the field for Sporting of Portugal.
Dominic Cervi should also be included in the squad for Celtic tonight against Atletico Madrid, and Jonathon Spector could well feature tonight in Birmingham's clash with Braga.
Here's the schedule in full:
1:00PM EST
GROUP A
Tottenham vs. PAOK Salonika
Shamrock Rovers vs. Rubin Kazan
GROUP B
FC Copenhagen vs. Vorskla
Hannover vs. Standard Liege
GROUP C
Hapoel Tel-Aviv vs. Rapid Bucuresti
PSV Eindhoven vs. Legia Warsaw
GROUP D
FC Zurich vs. Sporting Lisbon
Lazio vs. FC Vaslui
GROUP E
Besiktas vs. Maccabi Tel-Aviv
Dynamo Kiev vs. Stoke City
GROUP F
PSG vs. SV Salzburg
Slovan Bratislava vs. Atletico Bilbao
3:05PM EST
GROUP G
Austria Vienna vs. FC Metalist Kharkiv
AZ Alkmaar vs. Malmo FF
GROUP H
Birmingham City vs. Braga
Club Brugge vs. NK Maribor
GROUP I
Atletico Madrid vs. Celtic
Udinese vs. Rennes
GROUP J
Maccabi Haifa vs. AEK Larnaca
Steaua Bucuresti vs. Schalke 04
GROUP K
Fulham vs. FC Enschede
Wisla Krakow vs. Odense BK
GROUP L
Anderlecht vs. AEK Athens
SK Sturm Graz vs. Lokomotiv Moscow
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Think Altidore can get off the mark tonight? Who takes the points between Atletico Madrid and Celtic? Which of the Premier League four has the best chance of advancing?
Share your thoughts below
Actually, Fulham was in the Europa League in 2009-2010. I don’t think they were in it last year, so it would be 2 out of 3 years.
LEGIA!!
Celtic is in 2nd, to Rangers? Shocking!
And Celtic only got in because Sion got kicked out…
I thought Fulham was playing Twente?
yea they are.. that’s what it says
although yea calling FC Twente: FC Enshede is kind of like calling Sounders FC: Seattle FC, it’s just not really correct
correct, they were not in it last year
we are still in “EDT” until mid November
also Birmingham is not in the Premier League
any link for paok vs tottenham?????
The English gentlemen calling the Hanover 96 game just hack and destroyed Cherundalo’s name…called him ‘Sure Un Dolo”….:)
Cherundolo looks to be playing on the left. Is this a new development or has he played there before?
Onyewu is playing! Good for him.
Onyewu is playing! Good for him. Seriously!
That he just gave up an indirect free in the box is less good…
Lucky it hit the crossbar…
Don’t you mean “Cherundolo”?
Yes he has…my teenage daughter is a huge 96 fan so we watch theri games often…
SO no AZ match on DirecTV today…
(
was hoping to DVR it while I watched Fulham
Fun to watch Cherundolo – he is integral to Han 96 team, both on D and going forward.
you don’t say? maybe it was because they used illegal players!
which isn’t too far worse than Celtic getting in because there’s two clubs in their league.
Spector has started just about every B’ham game over the past month- -will likely start again against Braga. Has been playing D-Mid and doing well. They play in a half hour or so.
Goooooal jozy!!!!! … He has 16 goals in 12 games! Wooohooo… FIFA 12 that is.
Gee, that was funny.
“Tottenham, Stoke, Birmingham City and Fulham all carrying the banner for the EPL” – except Birmingham, of course, is not in the EPL
Holy Smokes Andy Johnson scored a goal.
HOLY SSSSSSSS!!! Jozy with the ridiculous blast!!! My goodness! That was for the haters and the fans.
WOW — what a shot!
…and he scores a Golazo. Wow.
That.. just.. happened.
Altidore is looking bright – but having a few too many poor touches – but that blast into the corner off a broken ball was special.
JOOOOOOOOOOOLAAAAAAAAAAZZOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
WOW what a BLAST!
No one was passing it to Jozy for the first couple of minutes so when he got a loose ball at the top of the box he decided to just rip it!!
Really good goal from Jozy. Twenty yards or at the top of the box, he rifled a shot top right of the goal, went through a defenders legs I think.
Well haters cant say “well its the dutch league and his goals will mostly be garbage goals”. That was all Jozy!!
I was debating whether to watch Jozy or Dempsey…
SO FREAKING GLAD I CHOSE JOZY! haha
Cant watch the game so tell me: better or worse than the gold cup blast?
Btw…jolazo: ridiculous….i f’ing love it
not a bad result losin’ 1-0 on the road to Eindhoven. We’ll get ‘em in Polska
Where are people watching this? I have Goal TV, but neither of those games is shown.
I’m watching em both!
What kind of strange formation does Jol have Fulham playing? Why is Dempsey listed a defender? Brilliant managing when you take your best attacker and put him as a defender! No wonder Jol is managing a different team every year.
I’ve been saying it for a couple of years now. Altidore will be a beast by WC 2014.
Come-on Fulham – you gotta get into the shooting mode. You’ve got the attack, where are your hard shots testing the keeper?
Definitely thought Jozy was 22. He’s still 21 for like another two months.
I went to a t d h e n e t dot t v and copy the name of the match and search it on google and got back a place to watch it… just in time for the jozy goal it was awesome….. during intermission they replied all of the highlights and the jozy goal got repeated like 20 times from about 5 different cameras
+1
Own goal by Mark Schwarzer? How the F did that happen?
Assist for Kljestian on their fourth.
Is this twat on one of the streams really saying that Andy Johnson looked more threatening than Deuce? I mean, I understand he scored, but he didn’t look great other than that.
No, no, you don’t understand. The players for Birmingham are actually literally carrying a banner for the English Premier League. The league asked them to, since it’s a really large non-figurative banner that it takes multiple teams to carry. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to upholding some standards around here. Literally.