Sevilla v Roma facts

Two clubs whose 2019/20 European campaigns started in the UEFA Europa League group stage meet for the first time in this long-awaited round of 16 tie, with Sevilla and Roma going head to head in a one-off encounter at the MSV Arena in Duisburg, Germany.

• Sevilla coasted through Group A in the autumn, winning their first five matches before signing off with a defeat at fellow qualifiers APOEL. They found the going tougher in the round of 32, needing the away goals rule to get past Romanian champions CFR Cluj (1-1 a, 0-0 h).

• Roma qualified as Group J runners-up on nine points, one behind section winners İstanbul Başakşehir, against whom they managed their only wins (4-0 h, 3-0 a). In the round of 32 they knocked out Gent, winning 1-0 in Italy before drawing 1-1 in Belgium.

Previous meetings
• Sevilla's previous 12 UEFA competition matches against Italian opposition have brought five wins and five defeats. Their most recent encounters came against Roma's city rivals Lazio in last season's UEFA Europa League, a 1-0 win in Rome preceding a 2-0 victory in Seville. Their sole meeting with Italian opposition at a neutral venue came in the 2007 UEFA Super Cup in Monaco and resulted in a 3-1 defeat by AC Milan.

• Roma have won just 11 of their 34 UEFA encounters with Spanish clubs (D5 L18) and only one of the last seven (D1 L5) – though the victory was particularly memorable, 3-0 at home to Barcelona to overturn a first-leg 1-4 deficit and win their 2017/18 UEFA Champions League quarter-final.

Form guide
Sevilla
• Sevilla played 16 UEFA Europa League matches last season, progressing from the second qualifying round to the round of 16, where they were dramatically eliminated by Slavia Praha after an extra-time defeat in the Czech capital. The Andalusian club re-qualified for this competition by finishing sixth in the 2018/19 Liga, which secured an automatic group stage berth.

• The three-time UEFA Europa League winners have never failed to progress from their group, making it five qualifications out of five this term and doing so as group winners for the third time. They defeated both Qarabağ and Dudelange home and away and also won 1-0 at home to APOEL before ending the section with a defeat by the same scoreline in Cyprus. Their final tally of 15 points was the most achieved by any team in this season's group stage, although the two draws against CFR mean they are now without a win in three European matches.

• Sevilla have won three of their previous four UEFA Europa League round of 16 ties, their only defeat having come last season against Slavia (2-2 h, 3-4 a). The wins came in their trophy-winning campaigns of 2013/14 (on penalties against local rivals Real Betis after both clubs lost 0-2 at home), 2014/15 (3-1 a, 2-1 h v Villarreal) and 2015/16 (0-0 a, 3-0 h v Basel).

• Sevilla have a positive record on German soil in UEFA competition (W6 D1 L3), all of those matches having been played against German hosts.

Roma
• Roma finished sixth in the 2018/19 Serie A, missing out on UEFA Champions League qualification for the first time in six years. They were defeated 4-3 on aggregate after extra time by Porto in last season's round of 16 having reached the 2017/18 semi-finals.

• The Giallorossi's third participation in the UEFA Europa League group stage, like the previous two, ended in qualification for the knockout phase, although unlike in 2009/10 and 2016/17 they did not top their group. Late goals were conceded in drawing at home and losing away to Borussia Mönchengladbach and they could only manage two draws against Wolfsberg.

• While the victory against Gent was Roma's third in succession in the round of 32, they have lost both of their previous two UEFA Europa League round of 16 ties, going out to fellow Italian club Fiorentina in 2014/15 (1-1 a, 0-3 h) and Lyon in 2016/17 (2-4 a, 2-1 h). Their only round of 16 success in the last seven attempts over the two European club competitions came in 2017/18 when they eliminated Shakhtar Donetsk from this stage of the UEFA Champions League on the away goals rule (1-2 a, 1-0 h).

• Roma have already played in Germany this season, losing 2-1 at Mönchengladbach on Matchday 4 – their tenth defeat in 13 visits to the country, where they have won just twice. Like Sevilla, they have never previously played a neutral UEFA fixture in Germany.

Links and trivia 
• Roma's Argentinian defender Federico Fazio made 152 Liga appearances and scored 12 goals for Sevilla between 2007 and 2016.

• Roma have three Spanish players in their squad – Pau López, Gonzalo Villar and Carles Pérez. Goalkeeper López played for Sevilla's city rivals Betis in 2018/19 before moving to the Italian capital, while Nikola Kalinić spent last season at Atlético Madrid and is currently on loan to Roma from the Liga club.

• Four Sevilla players have experience of Italian football – Franco Vázquez played for Palermo from 2012–16, Éver Banega was an Internazionale player in 2016/17 (and scored his first Inter goal against Roma), while Lucas Ocampos played on loan for Genoa and AC Milan, also in 2016/17, and Suso was a Milan player betwen 2015 and joining Sevilla in January this year.

• Roma's Aleksandar Kolarov was at Manchester City with Sevilla's Jesús Navas (2013–17) and Fernando (2014–17). He is also a current Serbian national team-mate of Sevilla's Nemanja Gudelj.

• Edin Džeko was also a team-mate of Navas and Fernando during his time at Manchester City (2011–16).

• There are three Argentina internationals in Sevilla's squad – Banega, Vázquez and Ocampos – and two in Roma's – Fazio and Diego Perotti.

• Sevilla's Luuk de Jong and Roma's Justin Kluivert are Dutch internationals, while Navas and López both currently play for Spain.

• Sevilla are one of two former UEFA Europa League winners in this season's round of 16, along with Manchester United.

• Sevilla have scored 121 goals in the UEFA Europa League, group stage to final, and need three more to equal the competition record held jointly by Villarreal and Salzburg. They have also registered 38 wins, the same number as Villarreal but one fewer than top-ranked Salzburg.

• The Andalusian club finished the 2019/20 Liga season in fourth place, thereby qualifying for the 2020/21 UEFA Champions League group stage for the sixth time.

• Although there are no Portuguese clubs in the round of 16, four of them having been eliminated in the last 32, Roma boss Paulo Fonseca is one of four Portuguese head coaches still involved in the competition, alongside Nuno Espírito Santo (Wolves), Pedro Martins (Olympiacos) and Luís Castro (Shakhtar).

• Roma concluded their 2019/20 domestic campaign with a 3-1 win at champions Juventus on Saturday, becoming the first Serie A visitors to beat the Bianconeri in Turin since Napoli in April 2018. The Giallorossi finished fifth to requalify for next season's UEFA Europa League.

Penalty shoot-outs
• Sevilla's record in six UEFA penalty shoot-outs is W5 L1:
4-3 v PAOK, 1990/91 UEFA Cup first round
3-1 v Espanyol, 2006/07 UEFA Cup final
2-3 v Fenerbahçe, 2007/08 UEFA Champions League round of 16
4-3 v Real Betis, 2013/14 UEFA Europa League round of 16
4-2 v Benfica, 2013/14 UEFA Europa League final
5-4 v Athletic Club, 2015/16 UEFA Europa League quarter-final

• Roma's record in four UEFA penalty shoot-outs is W1 L3:
4-2 v Norrköping, 1982/83 UEFA Cup second round
3-4 v Liverpool, 1983/84 European Champion Clubs' Cup final
3-4 v Real Zaragoza, 1986/87 European Cup Winners' Cup first round
6-7 v Arsenal, 2008/09 UEFA Champions League round of 16

The coaches
• Sevilla appointed Julen Lopetegui as their head coach on a three-year contract in June 2019, the former goalkeeper returning to duty in the Spanish Liga after a brief spell in charge of Real Madrid had swiftly ended in October 2018. A highly successful stint with Spain's youth selections brought European titles with the Under-19s in 2012 and U21s the following year. He had 18 months at Porto before taking charge of the senior Spain side and qualifying them for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, only to be dismissed on the eve of the tournament.

• Paulo Fonseca was appointed as the Roma head coach on 11 June 2019. He arrived in the Eternal City having won the Ukrainian league and cup double in each of his three seasons with Shakhtar Donetsk, where he had replaced the long-serving Mircea Lucescu in 2016. A central defender of modest repute, he paid his dues as a coach in his native Portugal, first making his mark at Paços de Ferreira then joining Porto in 2013 before winning his first major trophy, the 2015/16 Portuguese Cup, with Braga.