Union Saint-Gilloise – Malmoe

Belgian vice-champions are expected to pick up three points against the Swedish club

The first leg of Group D of the Europa League group stage saw the away side claim victory. Braga took away three points from Sweden and Union Saint-Gillois from Germany. The German club's progress to the play-offs is estimated at odds round 1.80, the Belgian at 1.95. In the second-round match between Union St-Gillois and Malmoe, bookmakers have identified Karel Gerarts' men as favourites. The club from Brussels burst into the Belgian top flight last season, nearly becoming champions. In doing so, the team beat Brugge by five points in the main league tournament, and fell four points behind in the play-offs for the title. Union Saint-Gillois began this season's European Cup qualifying campaign with a 2-0 home win over Rangers. Instead of making it to the Champions League play-offs in Glasgow, the Belgians lost 0-3 there and went on to conquer the Europa League. The Belgian vice-champion won the group opener in the German capital against local Union Berlin, playing roughly equal football. Malmoe, as champions of Sweden, also started the European season in the Champions League, but immediately failed to qualify against Zalgiris. Having moved on to the less prestigious Europa League qualifiers, the Sky Blue were clearly lucky to have drawn the lot. Here, the team easily got past Dudelange from Luxembourg and mediocre Sivasspor from Turkey. There is a high probability that Malmoe will not participate in the European competitions next season, as they failed in the national championship. Before the match against Braga, the team was led by Åge Hareide, who lost the match against the Portuguese, but won the game against Norrköping on Sunday. The champion now sits in fifth place, nine points behind the leader. Union St-Gillois are not performing at the top level, but leave the best impression in terms of team integrity and discipline. Even at the Allsvenskan level, Malmoe do not always perform decently at home, so they are unlikely to get even one point in Belgium.