Manchester United v St Etienne: Europa League a family affair for Pogba brothers

Brothers Florentin Pogba, left, and Paul Pogba, right, will meet on the pitch in Thursday's Europa League tie between St Etienne and Manchester United. Composite from agencies

The Europa League is forever caricatured as junior sibling to the mightier, sturdier, more glamorous Uefa Champions League.

As it takes up its secondary, late midweek slot with the resumption of the Uefa calendar, little brother will once again try to seize its opportunity to steal a march on the limelight seeker that drew all the attention the night before.

So much for the metaphor. In this Europa League, fraternal one-upmanship is played out for real.

Check through the contenders and you will see a Hazard in the line up, Borussia Monchengladbach’s Thorgen, who finds himself in the rare position of being further advanced in a European campaign than famous brother Eden, of Chelsea.

This Europa League winter would have had a Xhaka, too, if only Granit’s Arsenal had not dealt out such a weighty pair of defeats to brother Taulant’s Basel in the group stage of the Champions League, consigning the Swiss club to bottom place.

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A fraternal collision deserving of heavy drumrolls is scheduled at Old Trafford on Thursday. On the one side, the world’s most expensive footballer, youthful veteran of Champions League and European championship finals. On the other, his worldly big bro.

When the draw for the last-32 round of the Europa League was made in December, and pitched Manchester United against St Etienne, one proud mother found herself wishing for the impossible. “I want the two games to both end in draws,” Yeo Moriba told Agence France-Presse.

Alas, the tournament’s format is strictly knockout. “I know,” the mother of Paul and Florentin Pogba replied. “Unfortunately, one of them will be eliminated.”

Florentin, who joined St Etienne aged 22 for €500,000 (Dh1.93 million), versus younger brother Paul, who signed for Manchester United aged 23 for €105m, looks like an unfair match-up if you measure the contest on fees and achievements.

But when you consider that the older brother will be representing the club in fifth place in his league, the French top flight, against big-spending opponents who are currently only sixth in the Premier League, then the family watching from the grandstands may be in for some extended suspense.

Florentin and Paul both say they can hardly wait. Although they have tackled one another, experimented with dribbles and tricks at the other’s expense countless times in parks and gardens, official encounters on the pitch have been rare.

Partly that is the age difference, with Florentin and his twin Mathias three years older than Paul. Partly its because precocious talent being a shared quality among the brothers, they all left home young.

Florentin and Mathias — who now plays in the Netherlands at Sparta Rotterdam — left for Celta Vigo, in the west of Spain at 16, and Florentin became the first of the family to wear the blue jersey of France, at junior-age group level.

Later, both he and Mathias opted to represent Guinea, the West African country where they had been born. Paul, born in France, has meanwhile been a senior France international for almost four years.

Yeo said goodbye to her youngest when he was barely in his teens, with Paul joining United from Le Havre at 16. The story since is of soaring success, and much regret on United’s part for having let the teenager join Juventus in 2011, only to want him back last summer, so urgently they broke the world transfer record.

After a mixed start to his second spell at United, recent weeks have endorsed the huge outlay. What remains for Jose Mourinho, the United manager, is to finesse the best use of Paul Pogba, superstar and hero of the younger generation of fans, and find his best midfield role.

Where Florentin’s muscular, technically sound game is best deployed is also an issue for St Etienne, though a blessing rather than a headache.

He played at centre-back through his team’s unbeaten, 10-game run through the qualifiers and group stage of the Europa League, and through much of the solid Ligue 1 campaign so far.

Lately, though, the older Pogba has thrived at left-back, there for each of the three wins les Verts — or The Greens — have compiled in their last four league matches.

Wherever Big Bro Flo finds himself in relation to little brother over the 90 minutes, the pair will be close and intimate come the final whistle. The Pogbas have agreed, naturally, to swap shirts at the end.

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