'I call it a UK derby' - Oliver Glasner's Crystal Palace in Dublin to face Shelbourne

"When I was in England playing against Palace, they weren't at the heights that they're at now – so it just shows you what's possible for a football team," former Bolton Wanderers and West Ham United defender Joey O’Brien said.

UK DERBY: Oliver Glasner during a Crystal Palace media conference at Tallaght Stadium in Dublin. Pic: Seb Daly/Sportsfile.

Uefa Conference League phase

Shelbourne v Crystal Palace

Tallaght Stadium (Thursday, 8pm)

As was the case with Shamrock Rovers against Chelsea 12 months ago, Shelbourne are facing the Conference League favourites by hosting another English side in Crystal Palace.

Oliver Glasner’s side are FA Cup champions, sit forth in the Premier League and if they so desire, they could add at least another €100m to their coffers next month by offloading in-demand trio Marc Guéhi, Adam Wharton and Jean-Philippe Mateta.

Palace only dropped into Uefa’s third competition from the Europa due to multi-club ownership regulations.

They are expected to emulate Chelsea’s trophy feat of last summer but meet Shels at their temporary home of Tallaght with two wins and losses apiece from their four games.

Glasner recently slammed the club ownership – led by NY jets co-owner Woody Johnson – for underinvesting in the squad but actions, in the form of wins over Shels and KuPS in next Thursday’s final game, are expected from the Austrian.

“I call it a UK derby,” said Glasner, whose last visit to Dublin was as a substitute in Austria’s 1995 U21 defeat to Ireland at Richmond Park.

"If Austria plays against the German team, we always see a lot of emotion. I imagine it will be the same tomorrow.

"But all these challenges will help our team grow. We'll have setbacks but the important thing is we learn from it. The learning curve is quite steep."

Shels and fellow Irish representatives in this phase, Shamrock Rovers, occupy two of the three bottom places in the mammoth 36-team table.

Joey O’Brien’s side made a promising start by holding Swedish Cup holders BK Hacken scoreless but their inability to score has cost them.

Six points are a must from their final two matches to snaffle a playoff shot at reaching the last-16.

"When I was in England playing against Palace, they weren't at the heights that they're at now – so it just shows you what's possible for a football team," former Bolton Wanderers and West Ham United defender O’Brien said.

"But this is about us. I keep on saying that because that's the message I've given to the players.

“Sometimes you can think too far about things, thinking of who you're playing against and where they've come from.

"But for me, that doesn't work.

“It's about yourself, being proud of your own journey, how you've got here, and the incredible stories to get to this game.” The former Ireland international doesn’t consider the disparity of resources as tantamount to a mismatch.

“Players never hear me speak about fear in football,” he asserted.

“It's not pressure, only an absolute privilege to be in this situation.

“Pressure is a chap over in Gaza going to look for food for his family, wondering whether he can get enough food for his family, or his family will still be alive.

“That’s it's a great opportunity for us as a football club and the lads as players to really go out in front of a sold-out crowd to really show how good footballers they are, and that they belong on the pitch.”