Basel strike late to secure victory at Fiorentina

(Reuters) - A stoppage-time goal from Zeki Amdouni earned Basel a 2-1 win at Fiorentina in the first leg of their Europa Conference League semi-final on Thursday.

The Swiss Super League side are now in a solid position to become the first team from their country to reach a European final.

Fiorentina's semi-final curse continued as they remain winless in their last nine European last-four matches and ending that streak will be tough as Basel have only lost two of their last 13 European matches.

"In my opinion, we played a good game. Teams like Basel can take advantage of their chances," Fiorentina manager Vincenzo Italiano said.

"Our main problem was not scoring the second goal when we were dominating the game."

Basel thought they had taken an early lead but the effort was ruled out for offside following a VAR check.

Arthur Cabral headed Fiorentina into the lead after 25 minutes with his seventh goal of this season's competition but he did not celebrate out of respect for his former club Basel where he played from 2019-2022.

Fiorentina dominated the possession but Basel slowly established a foothold in the game and became more threatening as it wore on.

Andy Diouf equalised after 71 minutes with a well-placed low shot from just outside the box and Amdouni silenced the Italian fans three minutes into added time when he fired home from 10 yards after a free kick was floated towards the back post.

"We knew that they're dangerous from set-pieces and they punished us twice from those situations," Italiano said.

"They'll defend with low blocks, we will have to avoid the mistake we made today in allowing them to counter-attack."

The return leg will be played in Basel next Thursday with the winners to face West Ham United or AZ Alkmaar in Prague on June 7.