Maribor and Birmingham eager to make amends

NK Maribor and Birmingham City FC will look to make up for a false start on matchday one as they come together in UEFA Europa League Group H.

Previous meetings
• The sides are meeting for the first time in UEFA competition, and neither club have met teams from their opponents' home nations in competitive games before.

• Only three games have been played between Slovenian and English clubs in UEFA competition; Tottenham Hotspur FC won 2-1 at NK Rudar Velenje in the 1995 UEFA Intertoto Cup, then Liverpool FC eliminated NK Olimpija Ljubljana in the 2003/04 UEFA Cup first round, winning 3-0 at Anfield following a 1-1 draw in Ljubljana.

Match background
• Maribor have gone six games without defeat at home in Europe (five wins and a draw) since a 2-0 loss to AC Sparta Praha in the 2009/10 UEFA Europa League play-offs.

• Birmingham lost their first UEFA Europa League group stage game on matchday one, going down 3-1 at home to SC Braga. That loss ended a run of 13 games unbeaten at St Andrew's in European competition, including 12 games from the Inter–Cities Fairs Cup in the 1950s and 1960s, the non-UEFA affiliated precursor to the UEFA Cup and UEFA Europa League.

• Birmingham drew their only previous UEFA away game 0-0 at CD Nacional in this season's play-offs.

Team facts
• Maribor coach Darko Milanič started his career as a defender with FK Partizan, moving on to SK Sturm Graz and representing both Yugoslavia and Slovenia internationally. Hired to coach Maribor in 2008, he has now won two league titles and one Slovenian Cup.

• Chris Hughton replaced Alex McLeish as Birmingham coach in June following their relegation from the Premier League. The London-born former Irish international left-back spent the bulk of his career at Tottenham, where he also started coaching. His first senior role came at Newcastle United FC from 2009 to 2010.