CLIFTONVILLE go into tonight’s crunch second leg Europa League clash with AEK Larnaca looking to overturn a 3-2 deficit from the first leg – but they will have to do it without captain Jason McGuinness.
The central defender, who opened the scoring for the Reds at Solitude a week ago, is unavailable due to prior arranged off-field commitment and will be a big loss for Gerard Lyttle’s men. Jaimie McGovern is likely to return at the heart of the defence while midfielder Ryan Catney is available for selection after missing the first leg.
Having taking a 2-0 lead in Belfast through McGuinness and a second half Jay Donnelly strike, Cliftonville succumbed to three goals in 16 minute from the Cypriots and they need to score at least twice to progress to the Third Qualifying Round.
“We have to take into consideration the conditions we’ll be playing in as it’s extremely hot out here. We’ll be patient and we have our own game plan. We know a bit more about than we did before the first game. We already knew how technically good they were but we’ll have a look at how we set up and hopefully it’s enough for us on the night,” said Lyttle.
“No-one really gave us a chance going into the first leg. Everyone expected us to get turned over very easily, including Larnaca themselves. But I think now they will be giving us a bit more respect and they know we're a team that is very capable of scoring. We have plenty of talent within the team and, as I said last week, we’re capable of beating a lot teams. We’ll be going into the game with confidence and concentrating on our own stuff, rather than worrying about them.
Cork City take on Swedish outfit BK Hacken at Turner’s Cross level at 1-1 from the first leg while St Patrick’s Athletic take on Dinamo Minsk at Inchicore following their 1-1 draw in Belarus.
