Union Saint-Gilloise are useless and embarrassing if Newcastle United didn’t hammer them – Now fact checked | OneFootball

I have seen this said a lot, or similar, in the hours since Wednesday night’s match, that Union Saint-Gilloise are useless and it would have been embarrassing if Newcastle United hadn’t hammered them.

As the match went on, I knew that this would be the plan of attack.

How our enemies would try to devalue Newcastle United winning 4-0 away from home in the Champions League.

Not a sentence I was expecting to be writing any time soon!

So as Newcastle United fans, are we all embarrassing ourselves?

Would pretty much any other team have done the same away to Union Saint-Gilloise, would it have been a dominant 4-0 Champions League away victory for Liverpool, Roma, Union Berlin, Rangers, Eintracht Frankfurt, Nice…Sunderland?

Time for a bit of fact checking

Union Saint-Gilloise are the reigning champions of the Belgian top tier.

Still unimpressed? Fair enough, what about the Union Saint-Gilloise results at home in European competitions these past few years?

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 Rangers 0

Union Saint-Gilloise 3 Malmo 2

Union Saint-Gilloise 3 Braga 3

Union Saint-Gilloise 0 Union Berlin 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 3 Union Berlin 0

Union Saint-Gilloise 1 Bayer Leverkusen 4 (Europa League quarter-final second leg, Union S-G had drawn 1-1 in Germany in the first leg)

2023/24

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 Lugano 0

Union Saint-Gilloise 1 Toulouse 0

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 LASK 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 Liverpool 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 Eintracht Frankfurt 2

Union Saint-Gilloise 0 Fenerbahce 3 (Europa Conference League Round of 16 second leg, Union S-G having won the first leg 1-0 in Turkey)

2024/25

Union Saint-Gilloise 0 Slavia Prague 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 0 Bodo/Glimt 0

Union Saint-Gilloise 1 Roma 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 Nice 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 2 Braga 1

Union Saint-Gilloise 0 Ajax 2 (Europa League knockout phase play-offs first leg, Union S-G won the second leg 2-1 in Holland)

Union Saint-Gilloise home games in Europe these last three seasons (2022/23, 2023/24, 2024/25)

Played 18 Won 9 Drawn 4 Lost 5

So before facing Newcastle United, the last 18 European home matches for Union Saint-Gilloise had seen them undefeated in 13 of the 18 and indeed, winning nine of them.

Three of the five home defeats came in a Europa League quarter-final, last 16 of the Europa Conference League, Europa League knockout phase play-offs.

In none of these last three years were Union S-G eliminated in the group/league stage, each time they got beyond that.

I have seen Liverpool fans trying to write off their 2-1 away defeat to Union Saint-Gilloise in 2023/24 as purely down to playing a weakened team. Well in the game at Anfield that season in the group stage of the Europa League, Liverpool were only leading 1-0 until the 92nd minute when they added a second goal. So to try and dismiss Union Saint-Gilloise as a team you simply have to turn up for an easily defeat, is ridiculous.

PSV Eindhoven are no mugs and perform credibly in Europe season after season, yet they lost at home 3-1 to Union Sant-Gilloise in the opening round of Champions League matches this season. PSV went to Bayer Leverkusen last night and came away with a very decent 1-1 draw.

Having fact checked. Everything above points to the reality that Union Saint-Gilloise are serious opponents in European competition, a dangerous team that has given many very good teams a tough game. Especially at home, Union S-G very rarely losing. Never by a 4-0 margin!