Bruised Everton seek Sporting salve

Beaten soundly by their last Portuguese opponents, Everton will be out to prove a point when they welcome Sporting Clube de Portugal to Merseyside for the first leg of their UEFA Europa League round of 32 tie.

Previous meetings
• This is the sides' first competitive meeting. Everton had not faced a team from Portugal before their autumn encounters with SL Benfica in the group stage, when they suffered successive defeats against Sporting's city rivals.

• Everton fell to their heaviest defeat in UEFA club competition when losing 5-0 at Benfica in October. They also succumbed 2-0 in the return fixture at Goodison Park, surrendering a nine-game unbeaten home record in Europe in the process.

• Sporting have considerably more experience of facing English opposition. Their overall record from 15 matches against teams from England  is W7 D3 L5; away it is W2 D2 L4.

• Sporting's last visit yielded a 1-1 draw at Bolton Wanderers FC in the 2007/08 UEFA Cup round of 16. Simon Vukčević scored their goal and they completed a 2-1 aggregate success back in Lisbon through a Bruno Pereirinha strike.

• Sporting overcame English clubs Middlesbrough FC and Newcastle United FC en route to the 2004/05 UEFA Cup final that they lost at their home ground, the Estádio José Alvalade, against PFC CSKA Moskva.

Match background
• Everton and Sporting both won through from this round of the UEFA Cup in 2007/08.

• David Moyes's team beat SK Brann 8-1 on aggregate to reach the last 16, where they went out to ACF Fiorentina on penalties.

• Sporting prevailed 5-0 on aggregate against FC Basel 1893 and then got the better of Bolton before losing out to Rangers FC in the last eight.

• Sporting fared less well last season when European football resumed after the winter break, bowing out of the UEFA Champions League with a 12-1 aggregate defeat by FC Bayern München.

• Everton have lost their last two European home games, following the defeat by Benfica with a 1-0 reverse against FC BATE Borisov in December, albeit having already secured qualification from Group I.

• Everton had only lost two of their preceding 26 home matches in UEFA club competition before those reverses.

• Sporting have played five away matches in the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League this term and lost only one – the December defeat at Hertha BSC Berlin that came with top spot in Group D already assured.

• Carlos Augusto Carvalhal's side had previously recorded victories at both SC Heerenveen and FK Ventspils in Group D.

Team facts
• Hélder Postiga spent 2003/04 at Tottenham Hotspur FC and played in a 3-0 win against Everton. He claimed only one goal in 19 Premier League appearances but ended the season by scoring against England in Portugal's UEFA EURO 2004 quarter-final victory.

• As a player, Sporting coach Carvalhal was on the receiving end of a 6-0 reverse in England when his SC Braga side lost at Tottenham Hotspur FC in the 1984/85 UEFA Cup.

• Diniyar Bilyaletdinov played alongside Marat Izmailov for FC Lokomotiv Moskva prior to the latter's 2007 departure for Sporting. They have also featured together in the Russia national team.

• Louis Saha appeared as a substitute for Manchester United FC in home and away wins against Sporting in the 2007/08 UEFA Champions League group stage.

• Saha scored the only goal as Manchester United beat SL Benfica in Lisbon in the UEFA Champions League on 26 September 2006. He was also a substitute in France's 1-0 semi-final defeat of Portugal at the 2006 FIFA World Cup.

• New Sporting signing Pedro Mendes knows a fair bit about English football, having represented Tottenham Hotspur FC and Portsmouth FC from 2004 to 2008 prior to heading north of the border to sign for Rangers FC.

• Despite managing a solitary goal during a short stay on Merseyside in 1978, former Everton striker Mickey Walsh went on to score 42 goals in 75 games for Sporting's domestic rivals FC Porto.

• Goodison Park holds special meaning for longstanding Portuguese football fans – it was there that the legendary Eusébio scored twice for Portugal in their 3-1 win against Brazil at the 1966 FIFA World Cup and then hit four more to help overturn a three-goal deficit in a fabled 5-3 quarter-final comeback against Korea DPR. Goodison was then due to stage Portugal's semi-final against England, but the game was switched to Wembley.

• Goodison has been home to three Portuguese internationals in the last decade – Abel Xavier (1999 to 2002), Nuno Valente (2005 to 2009) and Manuel Fernandes (2007 and 2008) all having spells with the Premier League club.

• The tie concludes in Lisbon on 25 February with the winners to play either Club Atlético de Madrid or Galatasaray AŞ in the round of 16 on 11 and 18 March, with the second leg at home.

Everton
Suspended: none
Misses next match if booked: Tim Cahill, Tony Hibbert
Players added to squad: Phillipe Senderos, Landon Donovan
Players removed from squad: Jô, Luke Garbutt

Sporting
Suspended: none
Misses next match if booked: Liedson, Matías Fernández
Players added to squad: Pedro Mendes
Players removed from squad: Felipe Caicedo, Vladimir Stojković, André Marques