Leverkusen v Zenit background

Just a single point separates Group C's three leading teams and both FC Zenit and Bayer 04 Leverkusen will be looking to strengthen their challenge when they meet on matchday three.

Previous meetings
• The sides met in the 2007/08 UEFA Cup quarter-final with the Russian side triumphing 4-2 on aggregate en route to lifting the trophy. Both teams won their away legs, Zenit scoring three second-half goals in 12 minutes to win 4-1 in Germany. Andrey Arshavin opened the scoring, and Aleksandr Anyukov made it 3-1 after Stefan Kiessling had struck a first-half equaliser.

• The lineups at BayArena on 3 April 2008 were:
Leverkusen: Adler, Castro, Haggui, Greško (Sarpei 66), M Friedrich, Schneider (Barbarez 62), Rolfes, Barnetta, Vidal (Sinkiewicz 74), Gekas, Kiessling. 
Zenit: Malafeev, Anyukov, Shirokov, Križanac, Šírl, Denisov, Tymoshchuk, Zyryanov, Arshavin, Pogrebnyak, Fayzulin.

• Leverkusen won the return 1-0.

Match background

Leverkusen
• Leverkusen's only other experience of Russian opponents came against FC Spartak Moskva. In the 2000/01 UEFA Champions League first group stage, Leverkusen won 1-0 at home having lost 2-0 away; they lost 2-1 in Moscow in the 2007/08 UEFA Cup group stage.

• Leverkusen are in their ninth group stage campaign. After finishing second in their section last season, they lost 6-1 on aggregate to Paris Saint-Germain in the round of 16.

• The Werkself lost 1-0 at AS Monaco FC on matchday one, but followed that with a 3-1 win against SL Benfica.

Zenit
• Zenit's 2-1 win at Borussia Dortmund in last season's round of 16 was their third victory in their last five visits to Germany (the other two matches were drawn), although a 4-2 home defeat meant they exited the competition.

• Before 2007/08, Zenit had not defeated a German club in European competition, but under Dutch coach Dick Advocaat they played five games against Bundesliga sides on their way to lifting the UEFA Cup.

• They first drew 2-2 at home to 1. FC Nürnberg in the group stage and then, after overcoming Leverkusen, drew 1-1 at FC Bayern München before a 4-0 victory at Stadion Petrovski.

• Zenit are in their fifth group stage campaign. Last season they finished second with six points – the lowest total for a team progressing in UEFA Champions League history – to qualify for the knockout rounds for only the second time.

• They won 2-0 at Benfica on matchday one and two weeks later drew 0-0 at home to Monaco. 

Coach and player links 
• In January, Zenit defeated Roger Schmidt's FC Salzburg 1-0 in a friendly in Qatar.

• Emir Spahić played for FC Lokomotiv Moskva from 2006 to 2009 and scored in a 1-0 win over Zenit on 7 October 2007.

• Spahić also played for FC Shinnik Yaroslavl, FC Torpedo Moskva and FC Anji Makhachkala, where he was a team-mate of Oleg Shatov.

• Axel Witsel was sent off for Belgium in a FIFA 2010 World Cup qualifier against Spahić's Bosnia and Herzegovina on 1 April 2009.

• Andrey Arshavin scored in Russia's 2-1 defeat in Dortmund on 11 October 2008 in a World Cup qualifier against Simon Rolfes' Germany. Aleksandr Anyukov also played for the visitors while Vyacheslav Malafeev was on the bench.

• Leverkusen's Giulio Donati and Zenit's Domenico Criscito were team-mates in Italy's Under-21s.

• Kerzhakov scored in Russia's 1-1 draw with Son Heung-Min's South Korea at the 2014 World Cup. Viktor Fayzulin and Shatov also played for Russia in the Cuiaba fixture.

Match facts

Leverkusen
• Two up after nine minutes thanks to Son Heung-Min's double, Leverkusen squandered a three-goal lead in drawing 3-3 at VfB Stuttgart on Saturday.

• Three days after defeating Benfica, Leverkusen drew 2-2 with SC Paderborn. Karim Bellarabi equalised in the final minute against the visitors' ten men, Lars Bender having earlier levelled for the Werkself with his first goal of the campaign.

• Julian Brandt (ankle), Kyriakos Papadopoulos (shoulder), Tin Jedvaj (hamstring), Ömer Toprak (calf) and Hakan Çalhanoğlu made their returns from injury in Stuttgart. Gonzalo Castro (knee), Sebastian Boenisch (heel) and Rolfes (ankle) are sidelined.

• Bellarabi made his Germany debut in the world champions' 2-0 defeat by Poland on 11 October.

Zenit

• Zenit have drawn their last three matches, two of them 0-0. Prior to the first of those stalemates, against FC Spartak Moskva on 27 September, they had won 13 consecutive games, including a Premier-Liga record eight in succession at the start of a season.

• Villas-Boas, who turned 37 the previous day, watched his side recover from 2-0 down to earn a point at FC Krasnodar on Saturday. Javi García started the comeback seven minutes before the break but was sent off in the second half.

• Having missed Belgium's UEFA EURO 2016 qualifiers against Andorra and Bosnia and Herzegovina with a ligament injury, Witsel came off the bench in Krasnodar.

• Shatov returned to Zenit with a muscle problem after featuring in Russia's 1-1 draw against Sweden on 9 October. The midfielder was named Zenit's player of the month for September following a poll on the club website.

• Danny earned his first cap in 14 months but could not help Portugal avoid defeat against France in an 11 October friendly.