Hannover safe as Vorskla sign off

Hannover 96 lost their first UEFA Europa League game on matchday five and will look to get back to winning ways against FC Vorskla Poltava in Group B. • Hannover are certain to finish second in the group while Vorskla cannot lift themselves off the foot of the section. Previous meetings • Hannover clung on for a 2-1 win when the sides met for the first time on matchday two. Mohammed Abdellaoue (32) and Christian Pander (44) gave them a 2-0 half-time lead, but Vorskla roared into life after the interval and were unlucky not to add to a 50th-minute Oleksiy Kurilov strike. • It was Vorskla's first European home defeat in over a decade, since a 2-1 UEFA Cup loss to Boavista FC on 14 September 2000. • The match also brought Hannover's first ever European away win. Match background • Hannover remain unbeaten in four European home games (two wins and two draws) but their seven-game unbeaten run in Europe (six of them in this season's UEFA Europa League) ended with a 2-0 loss at R. Standard de Liège last time out. • They had not lost in Europe since going down 3-1 at SV Werder Bremen on their continental debut, in the first round of the 1992/93 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup. • Vorskla won all three of their away games in qualifying, but have not scored on the road since the start of the group stage, recording a 1-0 loss and a 0-0 draw. The only goal they conceded away in Group B was a penalty. Team facts • Vorskla boss Mykola Pavlov won a Ukrainian title as FC Dynamo Kyiv coach in 1995/96, and guided both FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk and FC Illychivets Mariupil in European games. • Pavlov's Dnipro were eliminated from the 1993/94 UEFA Cup by a German side, Eintracht Frankfurt; a 1-0 win in Ukraine was not enough to overturn their 2-0 first-leg defeat in Germany. • Hannover boss Mirko Slomka led the club he had previously served as a player and assistant coach into Europe to a fourth-placed Bundesliga finish in his first season in charge. • Slomka is competing in the group stage of this competition for the first time, but enjoyed success in the 2005/06 edition. He led FC Schalke 04 from the round of 32 to the semi-finals after replacing Ralf Rangnick as coach following the group phase. • Vorskla defender Armend Dallku and forward Ahmed Januzi know Hannover's Altin Lala from their time together with the Albanian national team. • Vorskla take their name from the river that runs through Poltava.