{"id":14214,"date":"2026-01-30T14:55:16","date_gmt":"2026-01-30T14:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/the-groundhog-day-derby-how-2-teams-will-clash-5-times-in-europe-this-season\/"},"modified":"2026-01-30T14:55:16","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T14:55:16","slug":"the-groundhog-day-derby-how-2-teams-will-clash-5-times-in-europe-this-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/the-groundhog-day-derby-how-2-teams-will-clash-5-times-in-europe-this-season\/","title":{"rendered":"The Groundhog Day Derby: How 2 teams will clash 5 times in Europe this season"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"article-meta\"><span class=\"timestamp \">Jan 30, 2026, 08:14 AM ET<\/span><\/div>\n<p>Groundhog Day doesn&#8217;t come around until Monday, Feb. 2. But for two soccer teams with a serious case of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu, it will feel like it&#8217;s come early.<\/p>\n<p>The playoff draws for the Champions League, Europa League and Conference League were made on Friday, and what transpired would make Bill Murray&#8217;s cynical weatherman Phil Connors shudder in recognition.<\/p>\n<p>The most noteworthy tie in the Champions League was an instant rematch between Real Madrid and Benfica, who met in the league phase earlier this week, when a dramatic last-gasp headed goal from Benfica goalkeeper Anatoliy Trubin kept Jos\u00e9 Mourinho&#8217;s team in the competition.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline editorial float-r\" data-behavior=\"article_related\">\n<h2 class=\"editorial-title\">Editor&#8217;s Picks<\/h2>\n<p>2 Related<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>But they aren&#8217;t the only two teams who will do battle again in European football&#8217;s knockout phases.<\/p>\n<p>Bulgaria&#8217;s Ludogorets and Hungary&#8217;s Ferencv\u00e1ros have been drawn against each other over two legs in the Europa League playoff round, meaning they will meet for a fourth and fifth time this season despite playing in entirely different domestic leagues.<\/p>\n<p>They first met in August across in the two-legged third qualifying round of the Champions League.<\/p>\n<p>The first clash produced a 0-0 draw in Razgrad, Bulgaria before Ferencv\u00e1ros won their home leg 3-0 a week later in Budapest, Hungary.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0130%2Fr1607854_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=570&amp;format=jpg, https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0130%2Fr1607854_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=1140&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0130%2Fr1607854_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=375, https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0130%2Fr1607854_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=750&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Ferencv\u00e1ros and Ludogorets have already met three times this season.\u00a0<cite>Attila KISBENEDEK \/ AFP via Getty Images<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>However, Ferencv\u00e1ros lost to FK Qarabag in the final qualifying round, meaning they dropped into the Europa League.<\/p>\n<p>Their fourth fixture in the league phase? You guessed it: a home clash with Ludogorets on Nov. 6, which ended in a 3-1 win for Ferencv\u00e1ros.<\/p>\n<p>After both teams finished in midtable in the Europa League league phase, they were drawn together on Friday in a playoff, with the first leg on Feb. 18\/19 at Ludogorets, and the return leg a week later on Feb. 25\/26 at Ferencv\u00e1ros.<\/p>\n<p>The good news for both teams is that that fifth fixture will spell an escape from this time loop for them &#8212; one side will advance to the round of 16, the other will be out of Punxsutawney &#8212; sorry, Europe &#8212; entirely.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jan 30, 2026, 08:14 AM ET Groundhog Day doesn&#8217;t come around until Monday, Feb. 2. But for two soccer teams with a serious case of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu, it will feel like it&#8217;s come early. The playoff draws for the Champions League, Europa League and Conference League were made on Friday, and what transpired would make [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_daextam_enable_autolinks":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football-transfers"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/r1607854_1296x729_16-9.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}