Lazio were beaten 3-0 by Bayer Leverkusen at the Bay Arena on Wednesday night in the Champions League, missing out on the lucrative group stages of the competition.
The Biancocelesti were unable to hold onto their first-leg advantage, as goals from Hakan Calhanoglu, Admir Mehemedi and Karim Bellarabi sent the Germans through.
Despite coach Stefano Pioli’s insistence the Biancocelesti would head to Germany to attack, it was clear that Lazio set out to stifle the Bundesliga side with little attacking intent other than the hard-working Keita Balde.
With Leverkusen dominating Stefan Kiessling flicked a header against the crossbar after 25 minutes, before Keita had a strong claim for a penalty shortly afterwards that would have strengthened the Biancocelesti’s position.
It was then, with the first-half set end goalless, that a combination of errors from Stefan De Vrij and Eddy Onazi saw the ball break to Calhanoglu to stroke home.
Within minutes of the restart it was two as more poor defending by Lazio, this time from Mauricio, allowed Mehemedi to stroll through and fire into the roof of the net.
As the visitors started chasing a vital away goal they were nearly punished again on the counter-attack, Bellarabi seeing a deflected effort bounce agonisingly wide.
On 68 minutes a miserable night for Mauricio was complete, receiving a second booking when a clumsy challenge took out Kiessling as he attempted to break through on goal.
Bellarabi eventually got on the scoresheet with Lazio pressing late on, Kiessling heading a long ball on for substitute Julian Brandt who played in the German international to finish.
Defeat does not signal the end of Lazio’s European campaign, but when they receive their Europa League opponents in Monaco on Friday they will no doubt wonder what could have been.
