Glentoran boss confident of turnaround

Glentoran boss Roy Coyle is determined his side will seize upon Sean Ward’s late lifeline last week to progress in the Champions League at the expense of Shelbourne at Tolka Park tomorrow.

Coyle conceded that but for Ward’s 77th-minute strike in Belfast last week his side would be heading south for the second leg of the all-Irish affair with virtually no hope of sealing a place in the second qualifying round.

Instead, after emerging from a first-leg barrage, Glentoran find themselves with only a 2-1 first-leg deficit to overturn and will feel the momentum is with them.

Coyle said: “Had it stayed at 2-0 it would have been a mountain to climb but we finished very, very strongly and that gave me great encouragement.

“We know the size of task ahead and we know we can improve, especially in the first 45 minutes, where Shelbourne were much the better side and might have been further ahead.”

Coyle said he would not read too much into the recent success of Belfast rivals Linfield, who travelled to Tolka for the Setanta Cup final in May and came away with a 2-0 victory.

Instead he will urge his players to recall the memory of last year’s first qualifying round victory over AC Allianssi, when Glens hit back from a goal behind in Finland to seal an unlikely success.

“We will take great encouragement from what happened in Finland last year after we got a draw at home,” Coyle added. “We know that we are capable of performing very well on any given day.

“My players know they did not do themselves justice last Wednesday. They will have lifted themselves and they will also have the support of a lot of fans who can help make a difference.”

Nevertheless Shelbourne will start as the clear favourites to move through to a second qualifying round tie against former European Cup winners Steaua Bucharest.

Captain Owen Heary admitted his team-mates were left kicking themselves after failing to secure the margin he believes they deserved from the first leg in Dublin.

And like Coyle, Heary too is thinking back to last year’s heroics when Shels overcame KR Reykjavik and Hajduk Split before putting up a fight against Spanish giants Deportivo La Coruna.

“We want to experience what happened last year again and we will be motivating ourselves by thoughts of a big match in the next round,” said Heary.

“We will approach the game positively and there is no way we will just be sitting back on our lead waiting for Glentoran to come at us.

“We created an awful lot of chances last week and I don’t think Glentoran really deserved to get their goal back.

“Everyone will expect us to win and we will remember the positives of last week, because it is always difficult to go away and dominate a team for 80 minutes like we did.”