LONDON: Zenit St. Petersburg and CSKA Moscow were among four teams to clinch their places in the knockout stages of the Europa League Thursday, continuing Russia's strong recent showings in Europe's second-tier club competition. Zenit, which won the tournament in 2008 when it was called the UEFA Cup, survived a late fight-back to win 3-2 at Hajduk Split, while 2005 winner CSKA scored three times in eight second-half minutes to beat Italy's Palermo 3-1. Belarusian champion BATE Borisov beat Sheriff of Moldova 3-1 to advance for the first time, while Stuttgart went through after a 3-0 win at Getafe. Tiago's spectacular late goal gave defending champion Atletico Madrid a 2-1 win at Rosenborg and Liverpool beat Napoli 3-1, but Sporting Lisbon and Manchester City each missed a chance to advance when they lost 3-1 away from home. Sporting lost captain Abel to a 77th-minute red card and then conceded twice to lose at Belgium's Ghent, while Manuel Arboleda and Mateusz Mozdzen scored in the last four minutes to give Lech Poznan victory over City in coach Jose Maria Bakero's first match in charge of the Polish side. Aleksei Ionov put Zenit ahead in the 32nd in Croatia before Szabolcs Huszti and Alessandro Rosina stretched the lead with penalty kicks. Huszti scored first time in the 47th but Rosina needed a rebound from goalkeeper Danijel Subasic's save four minutes later. Marin Ljubicic and Ante Vukusic scored to make it uncomfortable for Zenit, but the Russian side leads Group G with a maximum 12 points - eight clear of AEK Athens and Anderlecht, which drew 1-1. CSKA trailed to a 10th-minute goal by Massimo Maccarone but kept up its 100 percent Group F record to secure a place among this season's last 32 teams. Palermo's Antonio Nocerino was sent off for a second yellow card in the 31st and Japan midfielder Keisuke Honda equalized 16 minutes later. Tomas Necid then struck twice in five minutes, his second goal coming from a turn and shot that went in off the post. Sparta Prague won 3-1 at Lausanne in the other Group F match to take firm control of second place. Vitali Rodionov, Aleksandr Pavlov and Renan Bressan scored the goals that took BATE to 10 points in Group E and a decisive seven-point advantage over third-place AZ Alkmaar. Dynamo Kiev is favorite to advance with BATE after a 2-0 win over AZ. Atletico is second in Group B - a point behind Bayer Leverkusen, which beat Aris 1-0. Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard went on as a substitute and scored a hat trick in the last 15 minutes to give his team a third straight win for the first time in almost 14 months. Liverpool has eight points, three more than Steaua Bucharest and five more than Napoli and Utrecht. Sporting leads Group C with nine points, four more than Lille - which drew 2-2 at Levski Sofia. Lech Poznan shares the Group A lead with City on seven points. Juventus was three points back and can still advance but was held to a fourth consecutive draw in the Europa League, 0-0 against Salzburg. Paris Saint-Germain would also have qualified with a win but surrendered the Group J lead with a tame 0-0 draw against Borussia Dortmund. PSG is second to Sevilla in the standings. The Spanish club beat Karpaty Lviv 4-0 to go to nine points, one more than PSG. PAOK Thessaloniki beat visiting Villarreal 1-0 to climb two places to the top of Group D, while PSV Eindhoven beat visiting Debrecen in Group I to eliminate the Hungarian team.
