LONDON: Tottenham Hotspur’s Europa League hopes were crushed by unheralded Belgian side Gent, who booked their spot in the last 16 with a 2-2 draw at Wembley on Thursday as the hosts paid the penalty for Dele Alli’s first-half red card.

Gent, eighth in their domestic league, went through 3-2 on aggregate after the second leg of the last-32 tie as Olympique Lyonnais, Borussia Moenchengladbach, AS Roma, Besiktas and Ajax Amsterdam also progressed.

Lyon won 7-1 at home to AZ Alkmaar for an 11-2 triumph over two legs, Moenchengladbach stormed back from 3-0 down on aggregate to beat Fiorentina thanks to a 12-minute hat-trick from Lars Stindl and Roma cruised into the next round 4-1 despite a 1-0 home defeat against Villarreal.

Europa League favourites Manchester United beat St Etienne 1-0 away on Wednesday for a 4-0 aggregate victory. Also surviving to live another day in Europe’s second tier competition on Wednesday were Schalke 04 and Russian outfit Krasnodar, who saw off Fenerbahce.

Spurs had another night to forget in front of a record Europa League crowd of 80,465 at Wembley Stadium.

Playing their European games at the national stadium term due to building work at White Hart Lane, Spurs lost two of their three home games in the Champions League and now failed to overturn a 1-0 deficit from the first leg against Gent.

Christen Eriksen levelled the aggregate score after 10 minutes but an own goal that glanced off the head of Spurs striker Harry Kane 10 minutes later put Gent back in the driving seat, before a moment of madness from Alli sealed Tottenham’s fate.

The England midfielder showed the short fuse that was a factor in his early career as he leapt two-footed into a knee high challenge to draw a red card five minutes before halftime.

Spurs restored their advantage on the night with a thumping strike from midfielder Victor Wanyama but Jeremy Perbet, who grabbed the only goal in the first leg, scored again with a deflected effort after 82 minutes to end the hosts’ hopes.

“I am very disappointed,” said Tottenham’s Argentine manager Mauricio Poch­ettino. “We started well and scored. The tie was open but we conceded a goal in one action in the first half. After that it was complicated.”

Lyon displayed their attacking talent by following up a 4-1 victory in the first leg with Nabil Fekir scoring a hat-trick to crush Dutch side Alkmaar by the competition’s second-biggest margin, after Valencia’s 10-0 defeat of Rapid Vienna last year.

The 13 goals over two legs also equalled the competition record, set by FC Porto’s 10-3 win over Spartak Moscow in 2011.

Maxwel Cornet, Sergi Darder and homegrown players Houssem Aouar and Mouctar Diakhaby also scored for Lyon.

Fiorentina’s Nikola Kalinic and Borja Valero scored inside the first 29 minutes to give the Italians a three-goal aggregate lead before Moenchengladbach recovered to score four goals in a 17-minute span bridging halftime and advance in the unlikeliest of fashions.

Stindl converted a penalty a minute before halftime and then twice more in quick succession after the break before Andreas Christensen powered home a header on the hour to give Gladbach a 4-2 win on the night and a place in the last 16.

The other impressive comeback came from APOEL, who beat Athletic Bilbao 2-0 to advance 4-3 on aggregate. Pieros Sotiriou, who was later sent off, and Yannis Gianniotas scored early in the second half.

Zenit St. Petersburg looked like completing an even bigger fightback against Anderlecht when they went 3-0 ahead after 78 minutes through two goals by Giuliano and another by Artem Dzyuba, moving the Russian team into a 3-2 aggregate lead.

A 90th-minute header by Kiese Thelin, his first goal for Anderlecht, helped the Belgian club dramatically qualify on away goals and keep alive their dream of a first continental honour since their 1983 UEFA Cup triumph.

Four-time European champions Ajax had lifted the UEFA Cup the season before Anderlecht and the Dutch giants made it into the next round courtesy of defender Nick Viergever’s close-range finish in the 49th minute against Legia Warsaw.

The only goal over the two legs put Ajax through by the slimmest of margins.

A pre-match gathering with the pope couldn’t inspire a memorable fightback by Villarreal.

Behind 4-0 after the first leg against Roma, Villarreal recovered some pride by winning the return match 1-0 in the Italian capital as Rafael Borre scored but still bowed out.

Villarreal’s players had an audience with Pope Francis at the Apostolic Palace in Vatican City ahead of the game.

Celta Vigo won 2-0 at Shakhtar Donetsk after extra time to clinch a 2-1 win over the two legs while Olympiakos, Rostov, FC Copenhagen and Genk also progressed.

Published in Dawn, February 25th, 2017