Fiorentina, challenge to Celje: who are the opponents in the Conference League. Watch out for the bomber Kučys

Florence, 14 March 2025 – After having conquered (with merit) progress to the quarter-finals of the Conference League by beating Panathinaikos 3-1, the Fiorentina is preparing to challenge the championship Juventus (Sunday, March 16 at 18:21 p.m., at the “Franchi”) but is already studying the next opponent in the quarter-finals. These are the Slovenians of Celje who passed the first phase, finishing in 7st place (6 points in 13 games), beat Apoel Nicosia in the playoff and then eliminated Lugano on penalties in the round of XNUMX on the evening of Thursday, March XNUMX. 

The first leg in Slovenia is scheduled for Thursday 10 April, with the return leg in Florence a week later.

The passage to the quarter-finals of the Conference League represents a prestigious result for the New Club MIK CM Celje (full name of the club), Slovenian football club from the city of Celje, just under 40 thousand inhabitants, located in the north-eastern part of the country on the border with Italy. 

A modest team on paper (the squad has a total value of 13 million euros) is coached by the Spaniard Riera and can count on a great character (as demonstrated by the feat against Lugano) and on a Lithuanian bomber like Armandas Kucys: 22 years old, 1 meter and 94 centimeters, 8 goals in Conference (2 of which were in the preliminaries). The team won 3 national titles (one when Yugoslavia still existed) and was never relegated from the Slovenian first division.