Europa League Player Ratings | Freiburg 5-1 Genk (5-2 agg) – Vincenzo Grifo breaks Freiburg all-time scoring record and shoots Bundesliga club into quarterfinals

Vincenzo Grifo supplies the sizzle Freiburg’s record breaking ‘club man’ donned the captain’s armband on the evening while regular skipper Christian Günter moved to the bench. It wasn’t long before the dapper German-Italian put the German hosts in the lead with some of his trademark set-piece artistry. Matthias Ginter polished off Grifo’s free-kick cross in the 19th-minute to put the hosts up 1-0.

Genk nearly responded immediately one minute later, but SCF keeper Noah Atubolu kept the equalizer out with a brilliant save. Matthias Ginter sets up the second Last week’s GGFN Man-of-the-Match selection was once again hard at work in front of the hometown crowd. Ginter earned several rounds of applause from the Europa Park ultras for intrepid crunching tackles in the early going.

In the 25th-minute, Ginter quickly recovered the ball after his teammate Philipp Treu failed to keep possession. The ball found its way back to Ginter via Maximilian Eggestein and Yuito Suzuki. Ginter headed a deflected shot from Suzuki over to Igor Matanovic for a strange, yet well-earned, 2-0.

Genk restores the aggregate tie Suzuki nearly had a chance to put the Breisgauer hosts up 3-0 in the 38th-minute, but couldn’t quite contort his body to aim a shot properly as he fell. One minute after that, the Belgian guests pulled a goal back out of nowhere. Freiburg were caught ball watching as teenage Greek attacker Konstantinos Karetsas struck the post with an effort from the right.