Brugge spot on

Club Brugge KV 1-1 FC Shakhtar Donetsk (2-2 on aggregate, Brugge win 4-2 on penalties)
Club Brugge KV goalkeeper Danny Verlinden saved two kicks in a penalty shoot-out to take his side to the group stage of the UEFA Champions League at the expense of Ukrainian champions FC Shakhtar Donetsk.

'Man of the match'
The veteran goalkeeper showed his composure at the perfect time as he saved penalties from Oleg Pestriakov and Andrei Vorobiei to win the game on home soil and earn the rapturous praise of his coach Trond Sollied. "I have to mention my goalkeeper," said Sollied after the game. "He is the oldest goalkeeper in the Belgian league and he saved two penalties tonight. Truly he was the man of the match."

Superb free-kick
The only shame of tonight's game was that a penalty shoot-out had to settle the tie, as both sides had played good attacking football and will feel they could easily have won the tie in normal time. Afrter a slow start to the game, Shakhtar scored with their first meaningful effort on goal on the half-hour when Vorobiei curled a free-kick from 20 metres over the Brugge wall and beyond the flailing Verlinden to give his side a 1-0 lead and cancel out Brugge's away goal from the first leg.

Brugge struggling
Brugge struggled to create a coherent attacking response, and though Wojciech Kowalewski was forced to make a smart save from Andrés Mendoza after 24 minutes, a headed effort from Rune Lange and a shot from Gaëtan Englebert which both missed the target were a better indication of Brugge's lack of bite in attack, as their coach freely admitted.

'We were too stressed'
"We had big problems in the first half," said Sollied. "Not because of Donetsk because apart from the goal they scored they were never dangerous, but because we were too stressed. We were not relaxed, we lost too many balls and we did not even think about playing our own game. We also used too many long balls."

Kowalewski save
However, a series of second-half substitutions were to prove vital for Brugge, even though they initially showed no sign of being able to unsettle a resolute Shakhtar defence, with their best opportunity coming through a Serhiy Serebrennikov shot which Kowaleski saved.

Ceh on target
Vorobiei missed an excellent opportunity to score from barely three metres after 70 minutes, and was left to rue his mistake when Brugge substitute Nastja Ceh equalised with a free-kick just four minutes later. Mendoza nearly added what would have been the winner a minute later, but while both sides continued to attack with passion for the remainder of normal time another goal would not come.

Late chance
Extra time saw a similar pattern with both sides going all out for the winning goal and finding the two goalkeepers in fine form. Tim Smolders nearly won the game for Brugge with a minute of extra time remaining but missed the target to leave Verlinden to take the honours as his side's matchwinner after the penalty shoot-out.

'That's football'
Shakhtar coach Nevio Scala was left to rue his side's profligate striking after the game, but refused to accept that the better side had won. "For me, if you see the two games the better of the teams was Donetsk," he said. "I am very disappointed because we played a little better than our opponents. We deserved to reach the next round of the Champions League but that's football.

'We need more experience'
"I have to add also that we showed tonight that we need more experience. When you are missing chances like we did tonight it is very difficult to qualify."