Eintracht Frankfurt cruise into the Europa League quarter-finals

Going into the game with a 2-1 lead from the 1st leg, Frankfurt were able to play calmly and cruise into the quarter-finals of the Europa League with a 4-1 win against Ajax Amsterdam.

“Europa Eintracht” at it again! Frankfurt are one step closer to reaching the Europa League final after defeating Ajax Amsterdam 4-1 in the 2nd leg of the round of 16.

It didn’t take long for Frankfurt to get going: it was Jean-Mattéo Bahoya who put Frankfurt in the lead in the 7th minute after an assist from Hugo Ekitiké. Shortly after that, Mario Götze scored his 1st goal of the evening in the 25th minute after a beautiful long ball from Robin Koch.

Ajax were too weak on the night to really put up a fight against Dino Toppmöller’s side. Their plan of rotating the squad heavily did not work out against motivated Frankfurt players.

Frankurt meanwhile had many more chances to finish the game off in the 1st half, but they were not able to score more goals.

The start of the 2nd half was similar to the 1st with Ajax finding almost no ways to get near Kauã Santos’ goal, who replaced the injured Kevin Trapp on short notice.

Ekitiké put his team 3-0 up in the 67th minute – and many believed the game was finally over at this point. Funnily enough it was at this point when Ajax found some form and motivation.

Kenneth Taylor scored in the 78th minute to make the score 3-1 and suddenly there was small hope for all Ajax fans and players to get back into the game. They even had another good chance to make the scoreline even closer.

However, goalkeeper Matheus tried to act like a modern day goalkeeper would, coming far off his line to clear a long ball from Frankfurt – and made a mistake in the process.

Mario Götze took advantage of that mistake and tried his luck with almost a half-line shot – which turned into a goal! Final result: 4-1 to Eintracht Frankfurt.

In the quarter-finals, Frankfurt will come up against the winner of the AZ Alkmaar-Tottenham tie, which will be decided later this evening.