Slavia forced to rely on reserves

SLAVIA PRAGUE manager Karel Jarolim looked and sounded like a man under pressure at his eve of match press conference. And understandably so.

Ahead of the UEFA Cup clash against Cork City, his side has been so badly hit by injuries and suspension that the former Czech international has been forced to recall a player he had consigned to the reserves for turning up at training still feeling the effects of a night on the tiles.

Striker Pavel Fort was so disgusted with Slavia's elimination from the Champions League by Anderlecht last month that, after the 2-0 home defeat in an aggregate 4-1 victory for the Belgian side, he drowned his sorrows over a long night in this city of many bars and strong beer.

Described by local journalists as appearing "tired" when he showed up for training the next day, Fort was promptly demoted to the reserves by his furious manager. The player will make the bench as cover tonight but, yesterday, Jarolim made it clear that had all his first choice players been available, Fort would not even have been considered for the squad.

Six players, including club captain and central defensive midfielder Gedeon, are out of tonight's game; at least four of them would have been considered certain starters.

As well as a reprieve for Fort, Jarolim, whose son Lukas plays in midfield for Salvia, has also been forced to call up a handful of young reserve players to fill out his squad for a game which, as one local journalist put it to me, couldn't have come at a better time for the visitors.

In 1994, a Damien Richardson-led City were given what stand-in boss Dave Hill described as a 6-0 "footballing lesson" over two legs by Slavia Prague.

Billy Woods, the only player in the current squad to have been involved in that tie, recalls that the Czech side, which contained household names in the making like Smicer and Berger, were "frightening."

But that was then and this is now. Slavia, currently 12th out of 16 in the league and with no senior Czech international in their ranks, are clearly not the team they used to be. And more to the point neither, as Karel Jarolim conceded yesterday, are Cork City.

"We are definitely going to play different opponents from 11 years ago when we won easily," he said. "My assistant saw their most recent league game and we have also seen videos. They have very good players, including their two central midfielders and a number of U21 internationals. They are opponents we will have to be very careful against."

Jarolim rated his side as 60/40 favourites for the tie and admitted that, having already been knocked out of the Champions' League, he could not contemplate elimination from the UEFA Cup now before the group phase. However, he added warily, if that did happen, "life would go on."

Enormous pressure is on the boss to revive the club's fortunes. Slavia Prague had a full house of 19,000 for the second leg of the Anderlecht game, which they lost 2-0, but tonight's tie is expected to draw a crowd of just 6,000 and that's two thousand more than the club's average home league gate.

Up to 400 footsoldiers of the Rebel Army will be part of the attendance, all of them hoping to see Cork City give Slavia Prague even more reason to drawn their sorrows.