Skënderbeu v Lokomotiv Moskva background

KF Skënderbeu's pioneering UEFA Europa League group stage campaign is coming to an end, with second-placed FC Lokomotiv Moskva eager to ensure the Albanian champions do not bow out on a high.

• Skënderbeu can no longer reach the round of 32, while a win guarantees Lokomotiv's progress.

• Lokomotiv have an identical head-to-head record in their Group H games against leaders Beşiktaş JK, which means goal difference – and then goals scored – would be used to separate the sides in the event that they finished level on nine points.

•  Lokomotiv could lose and go through, provided Beşiktaş win at Sporting Clube de Portugal.

Previous meetings
• Lokomotiv won 2-0 in Moscow when the teams met for the first time on matchday two.

• The only previous UEFA competition tie between Russian and Albanian clubs – a 1979/80 European Cup Winners' Cup first round meeting of FC Dinamo Moskva and KF Vllaznia – was given as a walkover victory for the former, with Vllaznia withdrawing due to tensions between Albania and the Soviet Union.

Form guide
• Skënderbeu beat ten-man Sporting 3-0 in their last Group H home game to end a run of two straight defeats on their own turf in Europe. Their overall home record in UEFA competition is W7 D1 L3.

• Lokomotiv are unbeaten away from home in Group H (W1 D1), but lost for the first time in the section on matchday five, 4-2 at home to Sporting.

• Skenderbëu are the first Albanian side to feature in the group stage of a major UEFA competition.

• Lokomotiv have successfully navigated their way through two of their previous three UEFA Cup and UEFA Europa League group stage campaigns.

Trivia and links
• The journey from Moscow to Elbasan, where Skënderbeu are playing their European games, is around 2,100km.

• Lokomotiv's Slovakian defender Ján Ďurica turns 34 on the day of the Skënderbeu game.

• Skenderbëu are one of ten clubs in this season's group stage that qualified for Europe as domestic champions, along with Qarabağ FK (Azerbaijan), APOEL FC (Cyprus), FC Viktoria Plzeň (Czech Republic), FC Midtjylland (Denmark), KKS Lech Poznań (Poland), FK Partizan (Serbia), Celtic FC (Scotland), Molde FK (Norway) and FC Basel 1893 (Switzerland).

The coaches
• In charge at Skënderbeu since 2012, Mirel Josa was capped 27 times as a midfielder by Albania and spent the bulk of his career at KF Tirana before finishing up in Greece. He won a title as a coach with Tirana too, and has led his current side to glory in the last three Albanian league campaigns.

• A six-time Tajik international, Igor Cherevchenko lifted four Russian Cups as a Lokomotiv player between 1996 and 2001, and a fifth as coach last season. He is the first man to have won the competition as a player and a coach. Cherevchenko has been on the club's coaching staff since 2008.