MONACO: The Europa League draw on Friday set up two rematches of European Cup finals and two games in Germany for Israeli club Maccabi Tel-Aviv.
Feyenoord, the 1970 champion of Europe, will host Celtic in one of their league phase games and Nottingham Forest will have a home game against Swedish side Malmo, which were a semi-professional team in 1979 when they lost the European Cup title match to the English club.
Maccabi Tel-Aviv got away games in Germany against Stuttgart and Freiburg, and also will travel to play Aston Villa — in Birmingham, England — and PAOK in Greece.
Israeli clubs have been playing UEFA-organized games in neutral countries for security reasons during the conflict in Gaza, and Maccabi Tel-Aviv have hosted European games this season in Backa Topola, Serbia.
Maccabi Tel-Aviv’s home games are against Dinamo Zagreb, Lyon, Midtjylland and Bologna.
Roma — whose coach Gian Piero Gasperini won the Europa League with Atalanta two season ago — will have two trips to Glasgow to play fierce Glasgow rivals Celtic and Rangers among their eight opponents.
The Europa League uses the same 36-team league format as the Champions League. Teams play eight different opponents during the league phase and are ranked in a single-standings table.
Villa were one of 11 teams in Friday’s draw that played in the Champions League last season, though their coach Unai Emery is a four-time Europa League winner: three times with Sevilla and once with Villarreal.
Villa’s slate of opponents includes a trip to Fenerbahce, which parted ways with coach Jose Mourinho earlier Friday.
Forest are in the second-tier Europa League instead of Crystal Palace, the English FA Cup winner which was demoted by UEFA in a complex case relating to owners having stakes in multiple clubs. Palace will play in the Conference League instead.
Forest and their Portuguese coach Nuno Espirito Santo will play two opponents from Portugal, at home to Porto and away to Braga.
The top eight teams go directly to the round of 16 in March. Teams placed ninth to 24th advance to the knockout playoffs in February. The bottom 12 teams are eliminated.
The 36 Europa League teams will share a prize fund of 565 million euros ($659 million). Each club is guaranteed at least 4.3 million euros ($5 million).
