The winner of this year’s Europa League will be decided this evening. Chelsea will play against Benfica on Amsterdam Arena.
According to betting odds from Unibet, Chelsea are clear favorites to win the game and bring the trophy to Stamford Bridge. It’s worth to mention that this is the first Europa League final between two teams that came from Champions League. This could easily have been the Champions League final.
Also Chelsea have the chance to win both Europa League trophies in consecutive years, which will be a first. If the London club will win the competition then it will be fourth club which has won all three European club competitions. Juventus, Ajax and Bayern Munich are the other three clubs that have done that.
On the other side Benfica have lost only one game since September last year but that match could cost them the title in Portugal. With only two games left to play Benfica were first in the standings, two points above their arch-rivals FC Porto but things have changed after last game. Porto managed to win the game in the last minute and now Benfica have small chances of winning the title.
Those from Benfica fear the worst in the last act as they have lost all of the last six European finals since 1962. Coincidence or not that was after Hungarian coach Bella Guttmann, who has won two consecutive Champions Leagues in 1961 and 1962 with the club, said that Benfica do not deserve to win another European trophy. All this happened because Benfica’s president refused to increase his salary.
Now more and more Benfica fans think that this is a curse. In 1990 before the Champions League final Eusebio went to Vienna to Bella Gutmann grave to try to remove the curse but unfortunately for them Benfica lost the game by 1 – 0.
Even so there are some optimist players in their squad. Nicolas Gaitan believes that Benfica will win the game and so he will follow the steps of his idol, Diego Maradona who won the cup in 1989. Also Sven-Goran Eriksson believes in a victory for the Lisabona team. Their main advantage in his opinion is that they play a quick football and have a lot of technical gifted players.
The London club has a moral advantage. Chelsea and Benfica met last year in Champions League quarter final and the England club has won both games, 2 – 1 and 1 – 0.
John Terry and Eden Hazard will miss the game due to injuries while on the other side the squad is complete. This will be the second consecutive European final miss for Chelsea’s captain John Terry.