Four Dutch football clubs were in European action on Thursday night, with the shock win of the evening going to Go Ahead Eagles, who beat English Premier League side Aston Villa 2-1 at home in the Europa League.

Deventer-based Go Ahead, currently 12th in the Eredivisie, are playing in Europe for the first time thanks to their victory in last season’s KNVB Cup.

“I think it was difficult for them because of our fans and our tiny stadium,” Go Ahead striker Mathis Suray told the Uefa website after the game.

“They came here thinking, ‘Oh, we need to play against this small team in this tiny stadium with only 10,000 seats…’ but then you see how fiery the fans are and how close they are to the pitch because of the stadium’s small size. It really gives us an advantage.”

Elsewhere, Rotterdam side Feyenoord booked a 3-1 home win over Greek team Panathinaikos, who were also beaten by Go Ahead in the second round of the Europa League last month.

The match was first brought forward and then postponed because of storm Benjamin. Commentators said Robin van Persie’s team showed real resilience to fight back after going behind early in the game.

The match between AZ Alkmaar and Slovan Bratislava was also brought forward because of the storm. AZ won 1-0.

It was a different story for FC Utrecht, who had a difficult night away to Freiburg, losing 2-0.