Ramos's Dnipro take on Tottenham

FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk will look to win their first springtime European game as Juande Ramos faces his old club, Tottenham Hotspur FC, in the UEFA Europa League round of 32.

Previous meetings
• The teams are meeting for the first time in UEFA competition.

• Dnipro's three previous games against English sides have ended W1 D0 L2 (W1 D0 L0 at home – W0 D0 L2 away). They have lost both of their matches in England, with the team that beat them on their first visit – Middlesbrough FC, in 2005/06 – going on to reach the UEFA Cup final that season.

• Spurs' only experience of Ukrainian opponents came in a 2008/09 UEFA Cup round of 32 tie, which they lost 3-1 on aggregate to FC Shakhtar Donetsk, drawing 1-1 at White Hart Lane following a 2-0 defeat in Ukraine.

• Dnipro's Yevhen Seleznyov came off the bench to score Shakhtar's first goal in that game.

Match background
• Dnipro have reached the round of 32 for the third time since the advent of the UEFA Cup group stage in 2004/05, but have yet to go beyond this phase. They lost to FK Partizan that first season and to FC Basel 1893 last term.

• Dnipro have won three of their four European home games this season, but have yet to record a victory in ten fixtures in the spring phase of a UEFA competition, with their matches to date ending D5 L5.

• Spurs are on an eight-game winning streak, home and away, in this season's UEFA Europa League, and have not lost over 90 minutes in ten European fixtures, having bowed out of last season's competition on penalties following two 2-2 draws against Basel – who had earlier eliminated Dnipro.

• Tottenham (1972, 1984) are one of four previous UEFA Cup winners to have made it through the group stage along with Sevilla FC (2006, 2007), Eintracht Frankfurt (1980) and Valencia CF (2004). Five more former winners have now parachuted into the competition from the UEFA Champions League group stage: SSC Napoli (1989), Shakhtar (2009), AFC Ajax (1992), FC Porto (2003, 2011) and final hosts Juventus (1977, 1990, 1993).

• FC Salzburg and Tottenham were the highest scorers in the group stage with 15 goals apiece. Spurs, PFC Ludogorets Razgrad and Real Betis Balompié boasted the meanest defences, with just two goals conceded each.

• Tottenham and Salzburg were also the only clubs that came through the group stage with 100% records. Only three other sides have won all six of their group matches since the advent of the UEFA Europa League: Salzburg (2009/10), FC Zenit (2010/11) and RSC Anderlecht (2011/12).

Team facts
• Spurs' Jermain Defoe – who is leaving the club in late February for Toronto FC – and Trabzonspor AŞ's Olcan Adın were the group stage's top scorers with five goals each. With 22 UEFA Cup and UEFA Europa League goals, Defoe is 11th on the all-time leaderboard alongside Dennis Bergkamp, Martin Chivers, Jürgen Klinsmann, Óscar Cardozo and Karl-Heinz Rummenigge.

• Spurs goalkeeper Hugo Lloris could make his 50th UEFA club competition appearance against Dnipro.

• Dnipro goalkeeper Alexandru Vlad and Tottenham defender Vlad Chiricheş were team-mates at FC Internaţional Curtea de Argeş in 2008/09 and at FC Pandurii Târgu Jiu in the 2011/12 season.

• Dnipro's Czech goalkeeper Jan Lastůvka played in England with Fulham FC, Blackburn Rovers FC and West Ham United FC.

• Dnipro's Croatia forward Nikola Kalinić joined the club in 2011 after spending the previous two seasons in England with Blackburn.

• Ukraine and Italy are the most represented nations in the round of 32 with four teams each.

• Dnipro were the top scorers in the 2012/13 UEFA Europa League group stage with 16 goals.

• Tottenham’s American goalkeeper Brad Friedel became the UEFA Europa League’s oldest participant with his appearance against FC Sheriff at White Hart Lane. He displaced another keeper, FC Twente's Sander Boschker, as he took to the field aged 42 years and 173 days – 140 days older than Boschker. He was 42 years and 208 days old when he faced FC Anji Makhachkala on matchday six.

Coach information
• Dnipro coach since October 2010, Ramos led Sevilla to back-to-back UEFA Cup successes in 2005/06 and 2006/07, before short and less successful spells in charge of Tottenham, Real Madrid CF and PFC CSKA Moskva. A midfielder in the lower leagues in his native Spain, he worked his way up as a coach, taking over at Sevilla following a decent spell at Málaga CF in 2003/04, which included a celebrated 5-1 win against FC Barcelona.

• At Spurs, Ramos won the 2007/08 League Cup, but was dismissed at the start of the following season after his side took just two points from their opening eight league games.

• Ramos is one of five coaches in the round of 32 to have led a side to victory in this competition before. PAOK FC's Huub Stevens, who won it as a player (PSV Eindhoven, 1978) and a coach (FC Schalke 04, 1997), AZ Alkmaar boss Dick Advocaat (FC Zenit, 2008), Shakhtar's Mircea Lucescu (Shakhtar 2009) and SSC Napoli's Rafael Benítez (Valencia CF, 2004 & Chelsea FC, 2013) are the others.

• Spurs dismissed manager André Villas-Boas after the end of the group stage following a disappointing run of league results.

• Former Spurs midfielder Tim Sherwood stepped up to take temporary charge of the club, and later accepted an 18-month contract to lead the North London side until the summer of 2015. A Premier League winner with Blackburn in 1994/95, the three-times capped England midfielder had been on Spurs' coaching staff since 2008.

Round of 16
• The winning side will take on PAOK FC or SL Benfica in the round of 16, playing the first leg of the tie at home.

• Dnipro have never met PAOK before, but lost 4-0 on aggregate to eventual losing finalists Benfica in the quarter-finals of the 1989/90 European Champion Clubs' Cup.

• Spurs drew 0-0 at PAOK then succumbed 2-1 at home to the Salonika side in the 2011/12 UEFA Europa League group stage. They lost 4-3 on aggregate to Benfica in the teams' only previous meeting, in the 1961/62 European Cup semi-finals, with Benfica going on to win the competition, beating Real Madrid CF 5-3 in the final in Amsterdam.