We won’t be in holiday mode on Sunday, declares Stephen Kenny

Dundalk boss Stephen Kenny admits he will have to give serious consideration to how best to manage the balance of work, rest, and play for his players in the period covering their final two Europa League Group D games.

While the Lilywhites still have a busy domestic schedule to complete and an away game to Zenit to negotiate before the domestic season ends with the FAI Cup final against Cork City on November 6, thereafter they will go from feast to famine in terms of fixtures, with their games at home to AZ Alkmaar and away to Maccabi not taking place until November 24 and December 8 respectively.

Still, coming to terms with the disappointment of their 2-1 defeat to Zenit in Tallaght on Thursday, Kenny admits that he has had little or no time, given the team’s heavy workload, to look ahead to a time when, even with big games still to play, Dundalk will find themselves with unaccustomed time on their hands.

“We haven’t decided 100% what we are going to do,” he says. “We have come up with a few ideas but we have not nailed down anything. Maybe we need to go away somewhere for training and get ready and prepare properly. We’ll have a think about that and see what we need to do.

“One thing we won’t be going into is holiday mode. That won’t be happening. We need to prepare accordingly while also at the same time tailoring our training to a team that has played 50-odd games in a short period of time. You need the correct balance.”

Despite their defeat against Zenit, Dundalk’s four points from their first two games still keeps them in second place in Group D, with Kenny identifying the home match against AZ Alkmaar as crucial but also saying the he has a gut feeling qualification will go right down to the wire of their final game in Tel Aviv.

“It’s a big incentive to get through to the knockout stages, it would be phenomenal,” he says.

”We have to go away to Russia and away to Tel Aviv and also play AZ. And three teams will feel now they have a chance of second place.

“I take the point that teams will look at us differently now but what does that mean? At the end of the day, they can look at us differently but we still have a lot of talent in the team and good players who are getting better, I feel. The European games are bringing them on again so I would not be daunted.

”Zenit are overwhelming favourites to win the group and always were. I saw the way they celebrated beating AZ at home. It really means a lot to these players. It wasn’t like a routine win. They were really thrilled to win that game.

“I think they want to win the competition. There’s no rotation. They have 17 internationals but it was the same 11 against us apart from (Aleksandr) Kokorin who was left out tonight. They brought in (Oleg) Shatov. So I think they are keen to win it.

“Obviously second place is up for grabs in the group and we’re in contention and we have to keep it going. We have to plan now once the season finishes, what we do and all of that. We have to plan everything well and make sure our preparations are good because we have some big games to come — and obviously the AZ game here in Tallaght is a massive one.”