Who tops the stats in the Europa League?

All European club competitions are back this week, with the Europa League reclaiming its position on Thursday nights.

As the ads go, Thursday nights are Europa League nights.

The Champions League’s little sibling kicks off tonight with the first leg of the knockout stage play-offs. 

The eight teams who finished third in their Champions League group have dropped down into the Europa League, as they usually do. But the format has been altered a bit with the arrival of the new Europa Conference League.

Now, each former Champions League team will have to face one of the eight Europa League teams that finished second in their group. 

But that’s beside the point. This list is highlighting six of the main stats from the group stage and who topped them.

 

Most team goals scored - Napoli (15)

Napoli were the team to watch in the group stage, but not entirely for a good reason. While they do top this list for most goals scored as a team, they also conceded 10 goals. All six games they played had at least three goals scored in them.

Despite being the top scoring team, Napoli found themselves finishing second in their group as a result of losing to first place Spartak Moscow twice, despite having an identical record and a superior goal difference.

Napoli will now have to beat Champions League dropouts Barcelona in the knockout round play-offs if they want to continue on in the competition.

 

Most player goals scored - Karl Toko Ekambi & Galeno (6)

Karl Toko Ekambi has been in fine scoring form all season for club and country. With Lyon, he has six goals in both French Ligue 1 and the Europa League. For Cameroon in AFCON, he was second top scorer with five goals.

His goals helped Lyon to finish top of their group, going unbeaten along the way.

Galeno was doing the work for Braga in the group stage. He’s not typically their go-to goal scorer, having scored just three in 16 games in the Portuguese Primeira Liga. 

However, his surprising scoring efforts weren’t enough to see Braga automatically through to the Round of 16. They finished second in their group, which means to get to the next stage, they’ll have to beat Sheriff Tiraspol.

 

Most team assists - Leverkusen (11)

If we were counting most goals and assists combined, Leverkusen would be at the top. The German side scored 14 goals, a joint-second most, and had 11 assists, taking their combined total to 25.

What’s more interesting for them is that they have two players who rank joint-top for player assists so far. Florian Wirtz and Moussa Diaby both have three assists each.

Their brilliant scoring saw them top their table, which means they are straight through to the Round of 16.

 

Most player assists - Multiple players (3)

There are eight players who share the title of most player assists so far. They are Florian Wirtz (Leverkusen), Andrea Petagna (Napoli), Ricardo Horta (Braga), Mario Gotze (PSV Eindhoven), Moussa Diaby (Leverkusen), Filip Kostic (Eintracht Frankfurt), Kelechi Iheanacho (Leicester City), and Victor Moses (Spartak Moscow).

A thing to note here is that all but one player will be continuing in the Europa League with their teams. Kelechi Iheanacho and Leicester City failed to even qualify for the play-off stage and now see themselves in the Europa Conference League play-offs instead.

Not too much of a surprise if you know how Leicester have been doing this season.

 

Most clean sheets - West Ham, Galatasaray & Lazio (4)

Galatasaray and Lazio were in the same group and both feature at the top. So you can see that in two ways - either they both were too good for their group, or their group was kind of dull. Your choice.

Their goalkeepers stayed the same for their six games, which means Galatasaray’s Fernando Muslera and Lazio’s Thomas Strakosha rank at the top for most goalkeeper clean sheets.

West Ham started their campaign with Lukas Fabianski in goal, who did manage to keep a clean sheet himself. But it was for just the one game. Alphonse Areola featured in five of West Ham’s six games, keeping a clean sheet in three of them.

 

Most goals conceded - Celtic (15)

Celtic were another team who provided entertainment in each of their games. They had three games with five goals in them, with two of them finishing 3-2 to them and the other not was 3-2 to the opposing team.

As for the other three games that didn’t feature a scoreline with five goals in it. One boringly finished 2-0 to Celtic, another was 4-0 to their opponents. And the last, which was actually their first game they played, was 4-3 to their opponents.

As fun as their games were to watch, there will be no more in the Europa League, as the Scottish side finished third in their group.

If you do want to keep up with them, though, the Celtic show will continue in the Europa Conference League play-offs.