Dempsey and Kljestan score in Europa League

• by Paul Kennedy  @pkedit, Dec 14, 2011

[AMERICANS ABROAD] Clint Dempsey scored for Fulham, but the Cottagers were knocked out of the Europa League when Danish club Odense came back to tie the Cottagers, 2-2, on a goal in stoppage time. Sacha Kljestan had the first goal for Anderlecht in its 5-3 win over Lokomotiv Moscow.

Fulham was headed to the round of 32 until substitute Djiby Fall scored three minutes into stoppage time to leave the London club with eight points, one less than Poland's Wisla Krakow, a 2-1 winner over group winner FC Twente. The Cottagers would have gone through with nine points since they had won the tiebreaker with Wisla.

Anderlecht's victory was its sixth in six games, leaving it as the only unbeaten and untied team in the competition.

The only other American in action on Wednesday was Oguchi Onyewu, who started for Sporting in its 2-0 loss to Lazio. The Lions had already wrapped up first place and a berth in the final 32.

Group play in the Europa League concludes Thursday, and the round-of-32 draw will be held on Friday.

The eight third-place teams in the Champions League join the top 24 teams from the Europa League in the draw.