Football: Kaiserslautern become first team in UEFA Cup semis

The victory, which gave the Germans a 2-0 aggregate win, was tarnished by crowd violence which stopped the match for about 15 minutes at Philips stadium in Eindhoven.

Shortly after Mario Basler converted a penalty to give Kaiserslautern the lead on 70 minutes, dozen of Eindhoven fans charged the field entrance. Some fans were able to reach the pitch after the crowd broke through security barriers.

Spanish referee Antonio Jesus Lopez Nieto took both teams to the dressing-rooms as a precautionary measure.

Eindhoven team officials were among those who attempted to convince the fans to return to their seats.

"That can't happen. It's life-threatening," Kaiserslautern coach Andreas Brehme said. "With what happened, not even the security could have done anything about that."

Television pictures showed at least two people injured - one policewoman and one stadium official.

Eindhoven's best chance of many in the first half belonged to Joonas Kolkka, who beat Kaiserslautern keeper Georg Koch after an Arnold Bruggink's cross but his shot cannoned off the crossbar on the 36 minutes.

Georg Koch preserved the Germans' 1-0 lead from last week's match as the Kaiserslautern keeper blocked Arnold Bruggink's penalty shot after Mark Van Bommel was brought down in the area by Vratislav Lokvenc on 50 minutes.

PSV keeper Ronald Waterreus fouled Lokvenc in the box 20 minutes later and Basler buried the penalty to give the Germans the lead.

Three minutes later, PSV captain Van Bommel was sent off after a second yellow card to secure the Kaiserslautern's advancement to next month's semifinals.

The three other semifinalists will be decided later Thursday as Celta Vigo were hosting Barcelona; Liverpool were entertaining Porto and Alaves were at Rayo Vallecano.

(kil/dpa)