The New Saints and Žilina face at Park Hall Stadium, in a match for this phase of the UEFA Europa League (1st Qualifying Round). This will be the first direct confrontation between these two teams, as they have never met before.
The New Saints :
The home team plays its first game in this edition of the UEFA Europa League with the intention of taking advantage of the home factor to achieve a positive result. The team comes to this match after a home draw against Barry Town by (2‑2). In the last 10 home matches for all competitions, The New Saints won 7, drew 1 and lost 2. Their defense has not been very strong, since they have conceded goals in 7 of the last 10 matches, but their attack has scored regularly, having scored goals in 9 of the last 10 games. In their home matches there is a tendency for goals, as 11 of the last 15 matches have ended with Over 2,5 goals. In 12 games, they conceded the first goal 6 times, but got the comeback in 2.
The New Saints come to this game after a 2×2 draw with Barry Town, in a game for the Welsh championship. It should be noted that the locals finished in second place in the 2019/2020 Welsh championship. In this match against Zilina, coach Scott Ruscoe will have to align his team in the usual 4-4-2, with Adrian Cieslewicz and Greg Draper being the most offensive references of the local team. It should be noted that The New Saints have enormous competition in the offensive process, however, they have weaknesses in the transition from defense to attack and defensive stopped balls. There are no weight absences for this game.
Žilina :
The visiting team plays its first match in this edition of the UEFA Europa League with the intention of achieving a positive result as a visitor. In the last match they played, for the Super League, they lost to Pohronie by (2‑1). In their last 10 away matches Žilina has 6 wins and 4 losses. Their defense has not been very strong, as they have suffered goals in 8 of the last 10 matches, but their offense has scored regularly, as they have scored goals in 9 of the last 10 matches. There is 1 period that stands out in the last 4 away matches for all competitions: they have scored 4 of their 9 goals between minutes (76′ ‑ 90 ‘).
Zilina come to this match after a 2-1 loss on the trip to Pohronie’s stadium, thus adding the second loss in the last three games. The visitors finished in second place in the 2019/2020 Slovak Championship leaderboard. Usually, coach Pavol Stano plays 4-3-3, favoring counterattacks, mainly through the flanks: Ilko and Duris are experts in transporting the ball for attack. It should be remembered that the greatest weaknesses of the team are the stopped balls, counterattacks and defensive transitions. All players are available for this game.
