Monaco vs Leverkusen facts

After a five-goal thriller in Germany, Monaco and Bayer Leverkusen lock horns again in the south of France as both sides look to reach the UEFA Europa League round of 16 for the second successive season, with history significantly favouring the Ligue 1 side as a result of their first-leg win.

Monaco reached the knockout play-offs after claiming second place in a tightly contested UEFA Europa League Group H, where they finished level on ten points with section winners Ferencváros, whereas Leverkusen largely had a 2022/23 UEFA Champions League campaign to forget, failing to find the net in four of their six Group B matches but edging through to the UEFA Europa League in third place with five points thanks to head-to-head superiority over Atlético de Madrid.

Previous meetings

Monaco opened the scoring in the first leg at the BayArena through a bizarre Lukas Hradecky own goal, but Leverkusen responded with two goals of quality early in the second half, both skilfully despatched by Moussa Diaby and Florian Wirtz, before Krépin Diatta's firmly struck shot levelled things up 16 minutes from time. The decisive goal came two minutes into added time, Monaco skipper Axel Disasi's powerful and accurate strike from distance earning the visitors a famous 3-2 victory.

All six of the clubs' encounters prior to this tie were in the UEFA Champions League group stage. Monaco went unbeaten through the first five, winning three, before going down 3-0 at the BayArena on Matchday 6 in 2016/17 – though the French side had already clinched top spot in the group and would go on to reach the semi-finals.

Monaco were also semi-finalists in 1997/98, the season in which the clubs first met. It was Leverkusen's debut UEFA Champions League campaign and their first away fixture was a 4-0 defeat at the Stade Louis II. However, they drew the home return 2-2 as both teams went through to the quarter-finals with 13 points.

The two teams also progressed to the latter stages when they were grouped together in 2014/15, Monaco winning both direct encounters 1-0 to top the section with 11 points, one more than Leverkusen.

Curiously, in all three of the previous seasons in which Monaco and Leverkusen met not only did both teams qualify from their group, but the French side always had their campaign ended in the latter stages by Juventus.

Monaco's record against German opposition in UEFA competition is now W10 D6 L7; in home fixtures it is W5 D3 L3, although the two most recent encounters both ended in defeat – against Leipzig (1-4, 2017/18) and Borussia Dortmund (0-2, 2018/19) in the UEFA Champions League group stage.

Leverkusen's overall record against French opposition is now W8 D4 L8. Away it is W2 D3 L4, the second of those victories having come on their most recent visit, 3-2 against Nice on Matchday 5 of the 2020/21 UEFA Europa League, when Diaby opened the scoring for the German side.

Form guide

Monaco

Third in Ligue 1 for the second successive season in 2021/22, 17 points behind champions Paris Saint-Germain, Monaco returned to the UEFA Europa League group stage this term having dramatically lost their UEFA Champions League third qualifying round tie in extra time to PSV Eindhoven (1-1 h, 2-3 a).

The team from the Principality were also edged out of the UEFA Champions League play-offs in extra time by Shakhtar Donetsk last season and are therefore competing in the UEFA Europa League proper for the third time – after 2015/16, when they were eliminated at the group stage, and last season, when they topped their section unbeaten with 12 points before going out to Braga in the round of 16 (0-2 a, 1-1 h).

Drawn against three national champions, Monaco found the group stage less straightforward this term, though opening and closing wins against Crvena zvezda (1-0 a, 4-1 h) proved enough to take them through as runners-up behind Ferencváros, against whom they collected just one point (0-1 h, 1-1 a), but above Trabzonspor (3-1 h, 0-4 a).

Monaco have lost only two of their last ten European games at the Stade Louis II, winning five, and have conceded one goal in each of the last six (W3 D2 L1).

Monaco have a perfect record of 14 wins out of 14 from UEFA competition ties in which they won the away first leg, most recently against Sparta Praha in the third qualifying round of last season's UEFA Champions League (2-0 a, 3-1 h). Their only previous first-leg away win by a 3-2 scoreline also came in Germany, against Borussia Dortmund in the quarter-finals of the 2016/17 UEFA Champions League, Monaco also winning the return fixture 3-1 at the Stade Louis II.

Leverkusen

UEFA Cup winners in 1988 and UEFA Champions League runners-up to Real Madrid in 2002, Leverkusen were third in the Bundesliga in 2021/22, their highest league finish since 2015/16, securing a 13th UEFA Champions League group stage participation. Last season they topped their UEFA Europa League group but were eliminated in the round of 16 by Atalanta (2-3 a, 0-1 h).

The Werkself failed to progress from their UEFA Champions League group for the third time in four attempts this season, losing 0-1 at home to Club Brugge on Matchday 1 and twice to Porto (0-2 a, 0-3 h). While they took four points off Atlético (2-0 h, 2-2 a), they were out of contention after five matches and only lifted themselves off the bottom of the table on Matchday 6 when they drew 0-0 at home to the Belgian champions as Atlético lost in Portugal.

Leverkusen are familiar with the UEFA Europa League knockout phase, having competed in it seven times previously. They have lost their first tie four times, including in each of the last two seasons, their best performance coming in 2019/20 when they reached the quarter-finals only to lose the single-leg tie 2-1 to Inter Milan in nearby neutral Düsseldorf.

Leverkusen have failed to win any of their last six European away fixtures (D2 L4). Including that loss to Inter, their record on the road in the UEFA Europa League knockout phase is W4 D1 L6, with defeats in each of the last three matches.

Leverkusen have lost all 11 UEFA competition ties in which they suffered a home first-leg defeat, most recently going down to Atlético in the 2016/17 UEFA Champions League round of 16 (2-4 h, 0-0 a). The only previous occasion on which they lost 2-3 at home in the opening leg was against Villarreal in the 2010/11 UEFA Europa League round of 16 (1-2 a).

UEFA Europa League squad changes

Monaco

In: none
Out: Benoît Badiashile (Chelsea), Félix Lemaréchal (Brest, loan)

Leverkusen

In: Patrick Pentz (Reims), Florian Wirtz
Out: Andrei Lunev, Paulinho (Atlético Mineiro, loan)

Links and trivia 

Monaco's German striker Kevin Volland, a hat-trick scorer against Crvena zvezda on Matchday 6, joined the club in 2020 after spending four seasons with Leverkusen, for whom he scored 50 goals in 148 appearances in all competitions. He previously had four years as a Bundesliga player with Hoffenheim having started his career in the second tier with 1860 München.

Another German player in the Monaco squad is goalkeeper Alexander Nübel, who is in his second season on loan to the club from Bayern München. He spent five seasons with Schalke, making 46 Bundesliga appearances, before joining Bayern in 2020.

Monaco's Senegal international Ismail Jakobs was born in Germany, represented the country at Under-21 level and had two seasons in the Bundesliga with hometown club Köln before moving to the Principality club in 2021.

Switzerland international Breel Embolo spent six years in Germany – three each with Schalke and Borussia Mönchengladbach, scoring a total of 32 Bundesliga goals – before joining Monaco last summer.

Leverkusen's French winger Diaby joined the Rhinelanders in 2019 after one season at Paris Saint-Germain, with whom he won the Ligue 1 title. He is a fellow France international of Monaco's Wissam Ben Yedder, Youssouf Fofana, Disasi and Ruben Aguilar.

Amine Adli is another Frenchman in the Leverkusen ranks. He arrived in 2021 from Toulouse having just helped the club win promotion to Ligue 1.

Dutch left-back Mitchel Bakker is another former Paris player and Ligue 1 title-winner in the Leverkusen squad (2019–21).

Monaco's Guillermo Maripán and Leverkusen's Charles Aránguiz are national team-mates (Chile), as are Monaco striker Myron Boadu and Leverkusen pair Timothy Fosu-Mensah and Jérémie Frimpong (Netherlands). Volland and Leverkusen's Jonathan Tah, Wirtz, Kerem Demirbay, Nadiem Amiri and Karim Bellarabi have also played for Germany.

Leverkusen's new Austrian goalkeeper Patrick Pentz spent the first half of this season in France's Ligue 1 with Reims. He was an unused substitute in a 0-3 home defeat by Monaco.

Leverkusen head coach Xabi Alonso scored both goals in a 2-0 victory for Spain against France in the quarter-final of UEFA EURO 2012, which his country went on to win.

Monaco have won all five of their matches in February, prolonging the sequence with a 2-1 win at Brest on Sunday that keeps them third in Ligue 1, seven points behind leaders Paris. Leverkusen, in contrast, are down in tenth place in the Bundesliga following another 2-3 home defeat, against Mainz, at the weekend.

Penalty shoot-outs

Monaco's record in one UEFA penalty shoot-out is W1 L0:
3-1 v Real Valladolid, 1989/90 European Cup Winners' Cup quarter-final

Leverkusen's record in three UEFA penalty shoot-outs is W1 L2:
3-2 v Espanyol, 1987/88 UEFA Cup final
3-5 v Tirol Innsbruck, 1995 UEFA Intertoto Cup quarter-final
2-3 v Atlético de Madrid, 2014/15 UEFA Champions League round of 16