A historic evening in Athens. Olympiacos are on the verge of reaching the final of the Conference League, their first in any UEFA competition. Only 90 minutes separates them as this Thursday (10 PM EAT) in front of their fans they will defend 4-2 from the first match against Aston Villa.At the Giorgos Karaiskakis Stadium, everything will be turned against the English. They have to chase a two-goal deficit in front of around 32,000 chanting Greeks, which would not be easy even in an earlier stage of the competition, let alone in the semi-finals.Olympiacos coach Jose Luis Mendilibar perfectly prepared the tactics for the match in Birmingham, the red and whites absolutely deserved a convincing victory. After the first half hour, Ayoub El Kaabi scored two goals to give the Greeks a 2-0 lead, Villa managed to equalize later, but the guests again reached +2. At the end of the match, Douglas Luiz misfired a penalty, missing the opportunity to cut the deficit in half.🎉 Will Olympiacos be celebrating again tonight? 🧐#UECL || @olympiacosfc pic.twitter.com/ghxVXtbKEI— UEFA Europa Conference League (@europacnfleague) May 9, 2024 The fans of red and white are already dreaming about the showpiece against Fiorentina (on Wednesday, La Viola eliminated Club Brugge), which will also be played in Athens, at the AEK stadium. However, Mendilibar’s chosen ones must not indulge in euphoria, they must approach the rematch as seriously as possible.Olympiacos’ Englishman Omar Richards is also aware of this, saying that Villa’s strategist Unai Emery, a four-time winner of the Europa League, will certainly not allow his team to give up.”Aston Villa has a British philosophy, even though they are two goals behind, they will not accept that the doubleheader is over. We only played the first half of it, we know that they will attack us even harder in the second leg and I warned my teammates that we have to be ready for a counterattack. It is very important that we left Villa Park with a two-goal lead, it will benefit us in Piraeus, but at Villa, they believe in a turnaround,” Richards told The Sun.UECL: Athens bound Viola – second European final in a row for Fiorentina!The English public probably would not have attached so much importance to the Conference League if their representatives had not been eliminated in the quarter-finals of the Champions League and the Europa League. During that time, for the Greeks, the semi-finals of UEFA’s youngest competition is a historic success, on a par with winning the Champions League. A completely different perception.”We made history last week, took that first step, but we still have a lot of work to do. Everyone is excited, it was a great success. Mostly because we played without fear. We went out on the field with a good plan, we stuck to it and took an early lead. After that, our confidence only grew. El Kaabi scored a hat-trick and showed everyone how good a footballer he is. He didn’t stop running, he took his chances. He’s a real beast! We cannot say that Villa underestimated us, but we played very well. We stayed focused even when they came back to 2-2. It’s only important that we play the second leg like that,” Richards concluded.UEFA CONFERENCE LEAGUESemifinals – second legWednesdayClub Brugge – Fiorentina 1-1 (0-1) /first leg 2-3//Vanaken 20 – Beltran 58 pen/Thursday22:00: (3.70) Olympiakos (3.50) Aston Villa (2.00) /first leg 2-4/***odds are subject to change***
