BASEL 2016 UEFA EUROPA LEAGUE FINAL

The 2016 UEFA Europa League Final will be the final match of the 2015–16 UEFA Europa League, the 45th season of Europe's secondary club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the seventh season since it was renamed from the UEFA Cup to the UEFA Europa League. It will be played at the St. Jakob-Park in Basel, Switzerland today 18 May 2016,between English team Liverpool and Spanish team Sevilla who have won the in the two previous seasons.

The winners will earn the right to play against the winners of the 2015–16 UEFA Champions League in the 2016 UEFA Super Cup. They will also qualify for the group stage of the 2016–17 UEFA Champions League as the winner of the 2015–16 UEFA Champions League also qualify for the group stage through domestic performance, that means the berth reserved for the Champions League title holders is not used and passed to the Europa League title holders.

The St. Jakob-Park was announced as the venue of the final at the UEFA Executive Committee meeting in Nyon, Switzerland, on 18 September 2014. This will be the first European club final hosted at the stadium, although the previous stadium of the same name, the St. Jakob Stadium, which opened in 1954 for the 1954 FIFA World Cup and closed in 1998, hosted four European Cup Winners' Cup finals in 1969, 1975, 1979 and 1984.
The current St. Jakob-Park, nicknamed "Joggeli" by fans, was built in 1998 and opened in 2001, and is the home stadium of Basel. It hosted six matches at UEFA Euro 2008, including the opening match and a semi-final. Its current capacity is 38,512, but is reduced to nearly 36,000 seats for UEFA competitions.

After Basel got transferred to the Europa League after conceding to Maccabi Tel Aviv by away goals, Basel had the chance to become the first team to win the competition on home ground since Feyenoord in 2002, and the first to win it under the Europa League banner. This possibility ended after Basel was eliminated in the round of 16 by Sevilla.

Head to head, Sevilla are the most successful team in the history of the UEFA Cup/Europa League, with four titles, while Liverpool are joint second, tied with Internazionale and Juventus, with three titles. Neither side have lost in a UEFA Cup/Europa League final before. This is their first meeting in a European competition.

Liverpool previously won finals in 1973, 1976, and 2001. Overall, this is their 12th final in a European competition, with five wins in the European Cup/ Champions League (1977, 1978, 1981, 1984, and 2005) and two defeats in the European Cup/ Champions League (1985 and 2007) and one in the European Cup Winners' Cup (1966). This is the second European club final for their manager Jürgen Klopp, who lost in the 2013 UEFA Champions League Final with Borussia Dortmund, which were eliminated by Liverpool in this season's quarter-finals.

Sevilla previously won finals in 2006, 2007, 2014, and 2015. They are the first team to reach five overall finals and three consecutive finals, and have a chance to win an unprecedented five overall and three consecutive titles. Spain could also become the most successful country in the competition's history, with them currently tied with Italy with nine wins apiece. Sevilla's manager Unai Emery, who led them to the previous two titles, has a chance to win his third title, which will tie him with record holder Giovanni Trapattoni. José Antonio Reyes, who was in the squad of four previous Europa League winners (although he only played in three finals), could collect a record fifth Europa League winner's medal.

The "home" team (for administrative purposes) was determined by an additional draw held after the semi-final draw, which was held on 15 April 2016 at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland.

18 May 2016
20:45 CEST, 19:45 NGA

Liverpool	v	Sevilla

St. Jakob-Park, Basel
Referee: Jonas Eriksson (Sweden)

Assistant referees:
Mathias Klasenius (Sweden)
Daniel Wärnmark (Sweden)
Fourth official:
Svein Oddvar Moen (Norway)
Additional assistant referees:
Stefan Johannesson (Sweden)
Markus Strömbergsson (Sweden)
Reserve assistant referee:
Mehmet Culum (Sweden)

Match rules