Slavia Praha v CFR Cluj facts

Slavia Praha are in pole position to end a long wait to appear in the UEFA Champions League group stage as CFR Cluj come to the Czech Republic trailing 1-0 after the home game in Romania.

• A spectacular Lukáš Masopust strike in the 28th minute was all that separated the sides in the first leg on 20 August, although Slavia needed Ondřej Kolář's late penalty save from Billel Omrani to keep their first-leg advantage intact.

• While the most recent of CFR's three group appearances came in 2012/13, Slavia have not featured since making their debut in 2007/08 but did enjoy on an impressive UEFA Europa League campaign last season.

• Although the first leg was the teams' first competitive fixture, Slavia did beat CFR 4-2 in a friendly in Austria in July 2010.

Form guide
Slavia
• Champions of the Czech Republic for the second time in three years last season – their 18th domestic title – and also Czech Cup winners, completing their first double in the Czech Republic, Slavia are aiming to successfully negotiate the UEFA Champions League qualifying rounds for only the second time. Since their sole previous group appearance 12 years ago – when they finished third in their section behind Arsenal and Sevilla – the Prague club have lost in the preliminary rounds four times.

• Twelve months ago Slavia were beaten 3-1 on aggregate by Dynamo Kyiv in the third qualifying round (1-1 h, 0-2 a). Moving into the UEFA Europa League group stage, Jindřich Trpišovský's side finished second behind Zenit in their section and went on to get the better of Genk and Sevilla in the knockout rounds before losing 5-3 to eventual champions Chelsea over two games (0-1 h, 3-4 a) in the quarter-finals.

• Slavia's four defeats in five UEFA Champions League qualifying ties since 2007/08 include their sole previous play-off – against APOEL in 2017/18 (0-2 a, 0-0 h).

• This is Slavia's second European match of the season. The first leg was only their second win in their last 16 matches in the UEFA Champions League (D7 L7).

• Slavia are now unbeaten in their seven matches with Romanian clubs (W3 D4), the first-leg win in this tie ending a run of three successive draws, including home (0-0) and away (1-1) against Vaslui in the most recent encounters, in the 2007/08 UEFA Cup first round – a tie Slavia won on away goals. The Prague club won their other two home matches against Romanian visitors, including a 2-1 defeat of Steaua Bucureşti in their only UEFA Champions League group campaign.

• Slavia are already the sole Czech survivors in Europe this season, the other four representatives having all been eliminated, including three in the UEFA Europa League third qualifying round.

• Sešívaní have prevailed in eight of their nine UEFA ties in which they won the away first leg, most recently against Ajax in the 2007/08 UEFA Champions League third qualifying round (1-0 a, 2-1 h) – to seal their only group appearance to date. That is one of three ties in which Slavia won 1-0 away in the first game; their sole such defeat came against Shakhtar Donetsk in the 2000/01 UEFA Champions League third qualifying round (1-0 a, 0-2 h aet).

• Slavia's record in two UEFA penalty shoot-outs is W2 L0:
5-4 v Schalke, 1998/99 UEFA Cup first round
4-3 v Žilina, 2007/08 UEFA Champions League second qualifying round

CFR Cluj
• CFR claimed their fifth Romanian league title – and second in succession – in 2018/19, all five triumphs having come since 2008.

• This is CFR's fifth UEFA Champions League campaign, and ninth season in UEFA competition overall. They reached the group stage in 2008/09, 2010/11 – gaining direct access in both cases – and 2012/13, when they came through two qualifying rounds.

• The Romanian club lost to Malmö in the second qualifying round of last season's UEFA Champions League (0-1 h, 1-1 a) and got no further than the UEFA Europa League play-offs, where they were beaten away (0-2) and home (2-3) by Dudelange of Luxembourg.

• A 1-0 loss at Astana in this season's first qualifying round first leg made it three successive European defeats for CFR, and just three wins in 13 European matches (D2 L8), but they turned that tie round with a 3-1 home success and went on to beat Maccabi Tel-Aviv 3-2 on aggregate in the second qualifying round (1-0 h, 2-2 a). Dan Petrescu's side then produced a memorable 4-3 second-leg victory away to Celtic to win their third qualifying round tie 5-4 on aggregate.

• CFR's record in five UEFA matches against Czech clubs is now W2 L3, both wins coming against Slovan Liberec in the 2012/13 UEFA Champions League third qualifying round (1-0 h, 2-1 a). Their only other away fixture, in October 2009, ended in a 2-0 loss to Sparta Praha in the UEFA Europa League group stage.

• CFR's sole previous UEFA Champions League play-off was a 3-1 aggregate victory against Basel in 2012/13 (2-1 a, 1-0 h).

• CFR have lost both European ties in which they suffered a home first-leg defeat, most recently last season's UEFA Champions League elimination at the hands of Malmö – the only previous tie in which they lost 1-0 at home in the first game.

• CFR's record in one UEFA penalty shoot-out is W1 L0:
5-3 v Athletic Club, 2005 UEFA Intertoto Cup second round

Links and trivia
• Slavia's squad includes two Romanian players, Alexandru Băluță and Nicolae Stanciu. Băluță's clubs in his homeland included Chindia Târgoviște (2011–13), Viitorul Constanța (2013/14) and Universitatea Craiova (2014–18) while Stanciu represented Unirea (2008–11), Vaslui (2011–13) and FCSB (2013–16).

• Stanciu is a current Romania national team-mate of CFR Cluj trio Ciprian Deac, George Ţucudean and Ovidiu Hoban.

• Czech coach Dušan Uhrin Jr had spells as coach of both clubs, taking charge of CFR in 2009 and Slavia – where he had been youth coach between 1999 and 2001 – in 2015/16.