The brilliant Celtic stat that is under threat in tonight’s Europa League final

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Major Twitter account ESPN FC have tweeted a brilliant Celtic related stat ahead of tonight’s Europa League final.

Given our recent European knockout record, we don’t often find ourselves posting articles about the latter stages of continental competitions.

But Celtic haven’t always struggled at that level. Back in 2002/03, we were one of the highest performing sides in UEFA competition.

Under Martin O’Neill, Celtic reached the final of the UEFA Cup, eventually losing to Jose Mourinho‘s excellent, but dirty, Porto side.

Tonight, Mourinho bids to win the competition, now named the UEFA Europa League, once more.

He’s in charge of Italian giants AS Roma who face perennial tournament winners Sevilla in Budapest.

Mourinho has managed in numerous European finals since 2003 so it may come as a bit of a surprise to hear than Celtic are still the last side to net against him in such a match.

ESPN FC tweeted the brilliant stat to their 9.5 million followers, saying: “Henrik Larsson is the last player to score against Jose Mourinho in a European final. The year was 2003.”

Mourinho has been involved in four continental finals since then, across all three UEFA competitions.

AS Monaco 0-3 Porto (2004 UEFA Champions League final)

Bayern Munich 0-2 Inter Milan (2010 UEFA Champions League final)

Ajax 0-2 Manchester United (2017 UEFA Europa League final)

Feyenoord 0-1 AS Roma (2022 UEFA Europa Conference League final)

Larsson is not just the last player to net against a Mourinho team in a European final, he is the only one to do so. And he did it twice.

His goalscoring stat is under threat tonight, but it has been in the previous four finals too.

Will Mourinho’s perfect finals record continue tonight? Or will Sevilla’s stranglehold over the competition go on?

One thing’s for sure, it’ll be a much more relaxed watch than last year’s final for us all.

Tonight’s winner will join us in the group stage of next season’s Champions League.

In other news, Celtic Park seems to be getting ready for a potential party this weekend