Preview: Celta Vigo vs Freiburg - prediction, team news, lineups

Freiburg will travel to Spain for Thursday’s Europa League quarter-final second leg against Celta Vigo at Balaidos.

The Bundesliga outfit have one foot in the semi-finals after storming to a 3-0 victory in last week’s first leg in Germany.

Match preview

Celta Vigo took the tricky route to the Europa League quarter-finals after having to go through knockout round ties following their 16th-place finish in the league phase.

The Galician outfit saw off PAOK in the knockout phase playoffs, before they knocked out league phase winners Lyon via a 3-1 aggregate scoreline to set up a quarter-final tie against Freiburg.

However, their hopes of replicating their 2016-17 run to the semi-finals are hanging by a thread after falling to a heavy 3-0 defeat in Freiburg last week. 

Celta then suffered another 3-0 loss in Sunday's LaLiga home clash against relegation-threatened Real Oviedo, leaving them in sixth place and two points adrift of Real Betis in fifth position.

They have now lost three of their last four competitive games, and after shipping 12 goals in that period, they will need to shore up their backline if they are to have any hopes of staging a dramatic comeback on Thursday.

Claudio Giraldez's side have won four of their six European matches at Balaidos this season, although none of those have come by a three-goal scoreline.

© Imago / DeFodi Images

In contrast to Celta, Freiburg advanced straight to the last 16 after they finished in seventh spot in the league phase. 

Freiburg then overturned a narrow first-leg deficit in their last-16 tie against Genk, cruising to a 5-1 victory at the Europa-Park Stadion to ease through to the quarter-finals via a 6-1 aggregate scoreline.

Julian Schuster's charges produced another dominant home display in the first leg against Celta Vigo, as Vincenzo Grifo, Jan-Niklas Beste and Matthias Ginter all got on the scoresheet in a 3-0 demolition.

They recorded a second consecutive clean sheet in Sunday's 1-0 away win over Mainz, making it four victories from their previous five matches in all competitions (L1).

Freiburg, who occupy eighth spot in the Bundesliga, will now head to Spain for a European fixture for the first time since losing 2-0 to Sevilla in the 2013-14 Europa League Group Stage.

The Breisgau-Brasilianer have won just one of their five Europa League away games this season (D2, L2), but crucially, both of their defeats have only come by a one-goal margin. 

Celta Vigo Europa League form:

Celta Vigo form (all competitions):

Freiburg Europa League form:

Freiburg form (all competitions):

Team News

© Imago / ZUMA Press Wire

Celta are expected to be without Carl Starfelt, Mihailo Ristic, Miguel Roman and Hugo Alvarez due to injury. 

Defender Javi Rodriguez will return to the fold after serving a one-match ban against Real Oviedo for an accumulation of yellow cards. 

Giraldez will make several changes to the side that started on Sunday, with Rodriguez, Oscar Mingueza, Ilaix Moriba and Borja Iglesias are among those pushing for starting spots.

As for the visitors, they remain without the injured duo of Patrick Osterhage and Max Rosenfelder.

Daniel-Kofi Kyereh continued his return to fitness with an outing for Freiburg’s Under-23 team, although it is still unclear when he will be ready to return to first-team action. 

After making changes to his side at the weekend, Schuster could revert to the lineup that started last week’s first leg.

Celta Vigo possible starting lineup:

Radu; Rodriguez, Aidoo, Alonso; Mingueza, Vecino, Moriba, Carreira; Lopez, Swedberg, Iglesias

Freiburg possible starting lineup:

Atubolu; Kubler, Ginter, Lienhart, Makengo; Eggestein, Manzambi; Beste, Suzuki, Grifo; Matanovic

We say: Celta Vigo 2-1 Freiburg (Freiburg to win 4-2 on aggregate)

While Celta have not been in the best of form of late, they have won four of their six European home games this term.

With that in mind, we think they will prevail on the night, but we believe they will ultimately fail in their bid to overturn the sizeable first-leg deficit. 

For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.