Everton-Fiorentina: UEFA Cup Preview

As Cesare Prandelli and David Moyes continue to make last minute preparations for their UEFA Cup Round of 16 First Leg clash, one could predict that both sets of managers will be warning their respective sides against any thoughts of complacency when they square off Thursday night at Artemio Franchi Stadium.

After all, these are two clubs with very ambitious attitudes as the footballing calendar continues to wind down toward its conclusion.

Despite reigning from distinctly different football leagues, Moyes is right on the mark when he made the comparison between Everton and Fiorentina.

"I would see it (tomorrow's tie) more of two sides who in the future are going to be in the Champions League," said the Goodison chief. "Fiorentina are a very good team and I think there are a lot of similarities to Everton."

With Everton's strong run in the English Premier League and Fiorentina's surging run of form in the Serie A, both sides are coming off positive results leading up to the encounter. Fiorentina climbed within one point of fellow Italian rivals Juventus after a surprising 3-2 win. Everton, on the other hand, have set the pace for the fourth and final Champions League spot after winning against Portsmouth and Manchester City.

Perhaps even more bizarrely, the clubs will most likely have to do without their respective star players. Former Chelsea hitman Adrian Mutu has been ruled out of the match with a knee injury for approximately another two weeks, while Everton starlet Mikel Arteta is struggling to gain fitness in time for the date after receiving treatment in Spain on his groin.

When asked to comment, Arteta indicated that he is desperate to join his teammates and leave his injury troubles in the past.

"We have had a great season and we want that to keep going right until May. We are all confident we can do something special this season and it is a privilege to be a part of that. I want to play as big a role as possible in helping the lads continue to get good results, both in the league and in Europe."

Evidently, with the fantastic run of results, the players themselves are anything but short on confidence.

"I know I have a phenomenal player like Mutu ahead of me," young Fiorentina striker Pablo Daniel Osvaldo said of his injured Romanian teammate. "I just hope to take my chances in the best possible way. Some days everything seems easy, I hope it will be like that against Everton."

Everton goalkeeper Tim Howard echoed the same type of pre-match talk on the other end while acknowledging the danger that Fiorentina poses to his club side.

"Fiorentina beat Juventus on the weekend so that says all you need to know. It’s the last 16, there’s no easy team, we know that, but as you’ve seen recently we’re up for it. We’re ready to fight and ready to challenge and our football has been great.

"I think they’re very defensive minded. They’re tremendously organised and tactically they’re set up is going to be nearly perfect, so they’re going to take some breaking down but as you’ve seen over our European journey we’ve broken teams down and we’ve had the patience to do that and hopefully it will be the same on Thursday.

"Obviously we want the win but if we can get our away goal I think that that is very important as well. We have been unbeaten, but at the beginning of the year we had to qualify and no one would have foreseen a perfect 100 percent record in Europe since then, but we’ve done that."