In the final match of the Europa League group stage, Wolfsburg travelled to Lille and won all three points as they defeated Los Dogues by a score of 0-3 to advance to the knockout rounds of the competition.
We knew this match would be wide open and it showed early on as Lille knew they needed to erase a giant goal differential if they wanted to progress to the next round, while also needing to take all three points. In the first half, the French club had 10 total shots, but only two of them on target which, obviously, is not going to get the job done by any means. Ryan Mendes crossd the ball into the box and found the head of Idrissa Gueye, but his header slammed off the post for the first chance of the match after just seven minutes gone.
Gueye had another chance five minutes later, but it was blocked from well outside of the box. Marko Basa had an excellent chance to get the hosts on the board, but his header was hit too high after a corner, near the 30th minute of play. But it would be the German club to strike first just before the half after Vieirinha rounded off a very well worked team goal to give his side the very important goal.
The second half was more of the same, although it was Wolfsburg who were getting the majority of the chances as it looked like the hosts just lost confidence as the half went a long and five minutes after the hour mark, the German outfit put the dagger into the heart of the Lille supporters. Just eight minutes after his first yellow card, Guilavogui was sent off and Wolfsburg had to play 35 minutes down to ten men. Ricardo Rodriguez hit a sensational costless kick into the the top corner and Enyema could do nothing about the stunning strike.
Pape Souare had an effort on the Wolfsburg goal with less than 20 minutes to go, but his was saved easily by Benaglio. With fifteen minutes left to go in the match, Robin Knoche fouled Ronny Rodelin inside of the eighteen yard box but Divock Origi had his penalty shot saved excellently by the visitors goalkeeper and then Rodelin missed his header wide and to the left of the goal. In the dying stages of the match, Souare was called for a handball inside the box and Rodriguez calmly slotted the ball into the box to give them a three goal lead.
Wolfsburg were excellent throughout the match and deserved the win, however the German side will not win the group as Everton will finish the group stage on top. Meanwhile, Lille will finish at the bottom after Krasnodar's victory at Goodison Park.