Saints could not have had a harder draw with Vitesse being the highest ranked non seeded teams, but who are they ?

Vitesse or as they are sometimes known Vitesse Arnhem are based as you would guess in Arnhem in Holland and they play in the 25,500 capacity Gelre Dome. It features a retractable pitch and a roof.

Ronald Koeman managed the club from 1st January 2000 to 2nd December 2001.

They are experienced Europa league campaigners and last year lost in the 3rd qualifying round to Romanian side Petrolul Plioesti 32 on agregate.

Vitesse average home attendance is around 20,000 so they do not seem to be interested in stadium expansion anytime soon.

Vitesse finished 5th in the Eridivisie last season, 1 point behind Feyenoord in 4th, but 30 points behind winners PSV.

Photo: Action Images

ericofarabia added 13:06 - Jul 17 No Stadium Expansion Plans? Tin Pot little club with no ambitions. They could have sold over 40000 for this fixture ;-) I believe because of the retractable roof it is impossible/financially not viable to consider any expansion.
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thegeneral added 14:02 - Jul 17 At least RK will know their strengths and weakness's and our players will have a good pitch in a half decent stadium. Mirrors and sockets in the dressing room for pre match pruning and pro stewards/security looking after the bling. Think the players will prefer it to some eastern european cabbage growing community where the security is a gummy commie partisan with a shotgun.

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amsterdamsaint added 15:42 - Jul 17 Lovely city. Beautiful and Nice and relaxed. My Missus will be pissed off though, we are supposed to be in Prague !
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Zambucco added 21:57 - Jul 17 Amsterdamsaint it wasn't a lovely city when I was there. Bombed heavily in the war and their rebuilding plans are similar to Southampton. But a quaint red light area, a fantastic Greek restaurant and the biggest industrial estate I've ever visited
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SaintDownUnder added 22:47 - Jul 17 They took a hammering from Petrolul :-) Although it's a tough draw it's a great away day for the fans, reckon there might be a few beers consumed.......
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SaintBrock added 08:18 - Jul 18 Nick, surely the whole point of 'wanting' European football was that it offered a greater challenge to our skills than otherwise would have been presented. Why would there be any easy games? Did you really expect that we would just turn up, collect the trophy, take the pics and come home? You may inadvertently 'though have pointed out exactly why the whole European thing is a complete nonsense. There are still massive challenges for us in English soccer like winning the league which we have never done and winning the Cuo which we have done only once in our history. Familiarity hasn't changed the facts. So why embark on yet another challenge that we will never succeed in winning? Of course it is a distraction like the JPT, taking attention away from our real life limitations

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SaintDownUnder added 12:54 - Jul 18 Cheer up SaintBrock Europe is a by product of finishing higher up the table, do you want us to turn it down? As for embarking on a challenge we'll never succeed in winning, what's that all about? Surely as a saints fan you recognise the progress we've made? I hope to God you've tried to enjoy it?. The fact is the vast majority of football fans support teams outside the top few that have the resources required to regularly win titles...... We do it, because we love it, we operate in hope not in any expectation, and it's glorious. COYR

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