Jan's Euro vision

Jan Vertonghen would love to go all the way in the Europa League.

The Belgium international's initial target is to progress further than in his first season at the club - when we were beaten in the quarter-finals by Basel.

Thursday night’s victory over Partizan Belgrade secured a place in the knockout stage of the competition - the last 32 - with a game to go in Group C.

Now top of the group from Besiktas, who were held by Asteras Tripolis, we travel to Istanbul on December 11 knowing a point will see us progress as group winners.

Benji Stambouli scored the only goal as we made it three wins and two draws in the group with a 1-0 victory against Partizan at the Lane.

Both teams had chances in the first half but we took over after the break and were denied more goals by a string of fine saves from Milan Lukac.

“We wanted to qualify with the right result against Partizan and that’s what we’ve done,” said Jan.

“It wasn’t our best game but I think we got the result we wanted which is the main thing.

“We hope we can go even further in this competition than we did in my first season here when we were knocked out by Basel in the quarter-finals.

“I hope we can win the competition but it’s always hard - we want to go as far as possible.”