Conference League: Tre Penne and Tre Fiori learn their opponents

The draws for the First Qualifying Round of the 2022-23 Champions League and Europa League were scheduled for lunchtime today. At exactly midday came the pairings for the premier European club competition, which will see La Fiorita – reigning champions of San Marino – make their debut in the preliminary round, where they will meet Inter d'Escaldes in the semi-final as a seeded side. A potential victory over the Andorran outfit would earn the Gialloblù a place in the final against the winner of the tie between Levadia Tallinn and hosts Vikingur Reykjavík. Whoever comes out on top from the mini-tournament in the Icelandic capital (21-24 June) will face Malmö in the First Qualifying Round: the first leg will be played in Sweden on 5 or 6 July, with the return leg scheduled for the following week. If La Fiorita are unable to pull off the feat, the Montegiardino club’s European adventure will continue in the Second Qualifying Round of the UEFA Europa Conference League – the draw for which will take place tomorrow at 13:00. Meanwhile, Tre Penne and Tre Fiori have discovered their opponents in the First Qualifying Round of the upcoming UEFA Europa Conference League. San Marino’s runners-up were among the 30 seeded teams, while Tre Fiori – unseeded – were placed in the macro-group of the other 30 clubs. Based on their respective ranking, the 60 sides were split into ten sub-groups: Tre Penne in group 4, Tre Fiori in group 7. Thus, on the second draw, the club from Città was paired with the corresponding team from group 9 – namely, the Bosnians of Tuzla City. The club from the eponymous city finished second in the Bosnian league: their standout player is Krpic, who scored 15 goals last season. More generally, it was Tuzla’s attacking midfield unit that proved decisive for the light blue-and-whites over the recently concluded campaign, with three more players close to double figures. At the final pairing, the chance for Tre Fiori to meet Bala Town once again slipped away. The Welsh club, against whom the Gialloblù claimed a historic progression in the Europa League in the summer of 2018, will not stand in the way of the Fiorentino side this time. For the freshly crowned Coppa Titano winners, the opposition will be unprecedented and goes by the name of Fola Esch. The Luxembourg outfit, who in recent years have been the main challengers to F91 Dudelange – winning three of the last nine national titles – finished third in the 2021-22 season. The key man in Fola’s campaign was Mirza Mustafic. A versatile midfielder developed at Borussia Mönchengladbach, he posted impressive numbers last term with 14 goals and 15 assists. Three of those goals came precisely in the 2021-22 UEFA Europa Conference League qualifying phase, where Fola came through two rounds before bowing out to Kairat Almaty in the play-off round, just short of the group stage. The First Qualifying Round ties of the upcoming Conference League will be played on 7 and 14 July 2022. Since both Tre Penne and Tre Fiori were drawn at home for the first leg, UEFA is expected – in the late afternoon today – to announce the final fixture schedule for the competition, taking into account this and other overlaps that require subsequent adjustments.  

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