United's European opponents confirmed

Friday 30 August 2024 12:38

Manchester United's eight Europa League opponents for 2024/25 have been confirmed, following Friday's draw in Monaco.

As with the Champions League, the competition has been revamped this season, with the old 32-team, eight-group format replaced by a single, 36-team league phase.

Each of the competing clubs has been assigned two sides from each of the four pots, resulting in eight games - four home and four away - to be played between September and the end of January.

Exact dates and kick-off times for these fixtures, as well as their order, will be confirmed on Saturday, but scroll down to see who the Reds will take on this season...

HOME GAMES

Rangers PAOK Bodo/Glimt Twente

The headline Old Trafford fixture sees us host Rangers for the first time since 2010, in an all-British affair. The Glasgow club were one of our opponents during pre-season, with Amad and Joe Hugill scoring the goals in a 2-0 win at Murrayfield.

We've never played a competitive game against the other three sides who will be travelling to the Theatre of Dreams, although Erik ten Hag is familiar with FC Twente, having played for the Enschede club across three separate spells.

PAOK, from the city of Thessaloniki, are reigning Greek champions and have Shola Shoretire, a former Red, in their ranks, while Bodo/Glimt have won three of the last four Norwegian titles.

AWAY GAMES

Porto Fenerbahce Viktoria Plzen FCSB

The Reds will visit Porto's Estadio do Dragao for the third time, after previous trips in 2004 and, most recently 2009, when Cristiano Ronaldo scored a stunner to clinch a Champions League quarter-final tie.

There's a strong United link with Fenerbahce, who are managed by Jose Mourinho and have Fred in their playing squad. We played the Turkish side when we won the competition in 2016/17, although lost the group game at the Sukru Saracoglu stadium.

Viktoria Plzen beat Hearts to get to this stage and will host us for the first time, while we've never played Romanians FCSB before, either.

WHO QUALIFIES FOR THE NEXT ROUND?

Teams finishing in the top eight of the league phase will qualify automatically for the round of 16, while those placed between ninth and 24th will compete in a seeded two-legged play-off for the right to join them.

All UEFA tournaments are now self-contained after the qualifying rounds, which means the teams finishing 25th and below will be eliminated from European competition.

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