There were contrasting fortunes for the two remaining English sides in the Europa League this evening as Manchester United beat Saint-Etienne 3-0 at Old Trafford while Tottenham Hotspur lost by a single goal away to Gent.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic's hat-trick gave United a comfortable lead at the halfway stage of their tie, with the Swede notching his 15th, 16th and 17th goals against the French outfit - his most against any team.
Spurs, however, have work to do when they welcome Gent back to Wembley next week after Jeremy Perbet scored the only goal of the game in Belgium - with Harry Kane coming closest for the visitors when he struck the outside of the post.
One of the most high-profile ties of the round saw Villarreal host Serie A title hopefuls Roma, and it was the Italian outfit who all but sealed their place in the last 16 courtesy of a 4-0 victory at the Estadio de la Ceramica.
Emerson notched his first goal of the season to put the visitors in front before the in-form Edin Dzeko hit a second-half hat-trick to take his tally for the season to 28, including eight in the Europa League.
That sees him become the top scorer in the competition this season, overtaking Aritz Aduriz despite the 36-year-old once again finding the back of the net as Athletic Bilbao overcame APOEL in a 3-2 win at San Mames.
Aduriz struck his 250th career goal for club and country in between an own goal from Giorgios Merkis and an Inaki Williams strike after Georgios Efrem had opened the scoring, while Giannis Gianniotas pulled a late away goal back for the Cypriot visitors.
An Alexandre Lacazette brace helped Lyon to a 4-1 away win over AZ Alkmaar as the Ligue 1 outfit took a big step towards the next round, while Fiorentina were also away winners against Borussia Monchengladbach courtesy of Filippo Bernardeschi's 15th goal of the season.
Alongside Roma, the biggest winners of the night were Russian outfit FK Rostov, who thrashed 10-man Sparta Prague 4-0 having dropped out of the Champions League group stages.
Miha Mevlja, Dmitri Poloz, Christian Noboa and Sardar Azmoun were all on the scoresheet for the hosts, with Prague being forced to play an hour with a man disadvantage after Tiemoko Konate was shown two yellow cards.
Rostov's domestic rivals Zenit St Petersburg slumped to a 2-0 defeat away to Anderlecht courtesy of a first-half Frank Acheampong brace, but on the whole it proved to be a good night for the away teams as Shakhtar Donetsk, FC Copenhagen, Besiktas and Schalke 04 all won on the road - the latter scoring twice in the final 10 minutes to seal a 3-0 victory over PAOK, including a 50th goal for Klaas-Jan Huntelaar in European competition.
There were only five home winners from the 16 ties, with Krasnodar amongst them courtesy of a 1-0 win over Fenerbahce in the early kickoff - Viktor Claesson's fourth-minute strike proving to be enough for the Russian outfit.
Astra and Genk played out an entertaining 2-2 draw which saw two goals in the final seven minutes, while Olympiacos and Ajax both managed to hold on for 0-0 draws despite being reduced to 10 men - although the latter may feel hard done by after seeing a goal disallowed when officials ruled that it had not crossed the line.
Full list of results: Krasnodar 1-0 Fenerbahce; Astra 2-2 Genk; AZ 1-4 Lyon; Borussia Monchengladbach 0-1 Fiorentina; Celta Vigo 0-1 Shakhtar Donetsk; Rostov 4-0 Sparta Prague; Gent 1-0 Tottenham; Ludogorets 1-2 Copenhagen; Olympiacos 0-0 Osmanlispor; Anderlecht 2-0 Zenit; Athletic Bilbao 3-2 APOEL; Hapoel Be'er Sheva 1-3 Besiktas; Legia 0-0 Ajax; Man Utd 3-0 Saint-Etienne; PAOK 0-3 Schalke; Villarreal 0-4 Roma
Barney Corkhill
