Buckley urges Fingal to take chance

LIAM Buckley has no doubt his Sporting Fingal side will get chances to score against Maritimo at Dalymount Park tonight.

It’s keeping it tight enough to frustrate their Portuguese visitors, who lead 3-2 from the first leg in Madeira, that could well decide the tie and who meets either Welsh club Bangor City or Honka Espoo of Finland in the third round.

“It’s a difficult game,” said manager Buckley. “I’m not sure how they’ll address it, will they look to kill it off early and try and bag a goal, but, then, they don’t have to win.

“I’d like to think it will be a little bit cagey. We obviously have to win the game, but we don’t have to win it in the first minute.

“They may know us better now, but we know more about them as well. They may have a better handle on us, but they will have more respect for us given what happened over there. It’s in the mix.

“Psychologically, they don’t have to win. But I can guarantee he’ll say to his players ‘let’s go and try to win the game‘, all manager will do that.

“But in real terms they’ll still think ‘we’re through at 3-2‘. It’s only if we score that alarm bells will start going off all over the place because they’re out.

“I’ve no doubt they’ll try and bag an early goal. That would make it very difficult for us, but not impossible.

“So we’ve got to make sure we keep it tight and keep ourselves in the game. I’ve no doubt we’ll get chances.

“We did over there with Ronan Finn, Shaunie Williams’ header and we scored a couple of goals. We will get chances. I just hope we get them before they do.”

Striker Glen Crowe, who scored Sporting’s opener in the first leg to set a record for a League of Ireland player of 11 goals in Europe, has stressed the need for patience.

“We don’t need to be chasing them early on, it’s over 90 minutes,” said Crowe.

“We can be patient. It’s important we don’t concede, if we do then we need to score two.

“We must be patient, look to make things happen, probe. We only need one goal. We must be solid defensively and, as I said, only one goal is needed. Whether it comes in the first or the 90th minute, it will do.”

In what’s likely to be Buckley’s only change from last Thursday, Shaun Maher comes back into the side in central defence for Colin Hawkins who has three broken ribs.

Maritimo are without their €5 million-rated Angolan international winger Djalma while Brazilian midfielder Miranda remains out injured also.