Portuguese trio lead quarter-final lineup

There will be three Portuguese Liga sides in the UEFA Europa League quarter-finals after FC Porto, SL Benfica and SC Braga all qualified following Thursday's round of 16 second legs.

They will be joined by FC Dynamo Kyiv, FC Twente, Villarreal CF, PSV Eindhoven and FC Spartak Moskva for the last-eight and semi-final draws, which take place from 13.00CET on Friday and be conducted by UEFA competitions director Giorgio Marchetti and Dublin final ambassador Ronnie Whelan.

At this stage of the tournament, no teams are seeded and clubs from the same national association can be drawn against each other. The quarter-finals are played on a home-and-away basis on 7 and 14 April, with the semi-finals on 28 April and 5 May. This season's showpiece is at the Dublin Arena on Wednesday 18 May.

Nail-biting conclusions
Porto's 2-1 success against PFC CSKA Moskva earned André Villas-Boas's charges a 3-1 aggregate victory, Benfica's 1-1 draw edged the Eagles past Paris-Saint Germain FC 2-1 over the two legs and Braga held on for a goalless draw at Anfield to knock out Liverpool FC 1-0. It provides Portugal with three clubs in the last eight of a European competition for the first time.

Dynamo and Twente were both tested to the limit as they resisted the best efforts of respective hosts Manchester City FC and FC Zenit St Petersburg. Twente's 3-0 first-leg lead was whittled down to one goal while Aleksandar Kolarov gave Roberto Mancini's side hope of overturning a 2-0 deficit. City paid the price for Mario Balotelli's first-half dismissal and a late miss by Carlos Tévez.

Porto (2002/03) and PSV (1977/78) are the only surviving previous winners of the competition, while Benfica, two-time European Champion Clubs' Cup winners, were UEFA Cup runners-up in 1982/83.