I was at the Milltown game last time and there was very little trouble, It was an afternoon kickoff with high security though. There was a lot of trouble at Bohs v Rangers 2 weeks earlier.
It was a cracking tie with Rovers throwing the kitchen sink at Linfield for the last 20 minutes but lost on away goals.
Some statto has worked out based on last years regionalisation that the unseeded teams we are likely to face are either
Skonto Riga Latvia
Bangor City Wales
HB Torshavn Faroes
Linfield Belfast N.Ireland
F91 Dudelange Luxembourg
Breidablik Iceland
Flora Tallinn Estonia
He said "There might be more or less teams in our region because they have to even out the seeded and non seeded teams. (There can't be 7 seeded and 3 unseeded in the draw!)"
The other seeded teams are
Rosenborg Norway
Malmo Sweden
Helsinki Finland
Eranas Lituania
Austria
Bate Borisov
so great if we have now avoided rosenborg.
On paper Ig guess we'd be strong favourites against
Bangor City Wales
HB Torshavn Faroes
Linfield Belfast N.Ireland
F91 Dudelange Luxembourg
Breidablik Iceland
and these two might be a bit trickier
Flora Tallinn Estonia
Skonto Riga Latvia
Anyways surely a good chance for Rovers to get past this round and build up some coefficient along the way hopefully.
Wow, huge relief to have avoided all of those teams. I don't know much about Eranas but I assume they're decent enough.
Derry beat Skonto Riga a couple of years ago. Drogs beat some team from Tallinn that year too I think (in CL qualifiers)
Rovers would be favourite in all ties
Can't see Rovers having a problem in their first round tie. None of the opponents will present a challenge to their side.
Cork City beat Ekranas a few years back. Not sure if its the same team you are talking about there.
With all the movement Glentoran could now be seeded.
Seems to depend on Macedonian Cup final. Metalurgs finished second in the league and are in the cup final.
They have the lowest co-efficient of the possible teams. So if they win the cup - enter in the next round - both 3rd and 4th would be seeded. If they lose the cup final then Glentoran would be seeded.
So Glentoran fans should want Metalurgs to win, and Pat's should probably be hoping they lose - to keep the glens as possible opponents.
Wow, twelve months on and people are still talking about TNS and Bohemians. You boyos need to get over it
Hopefully in future I'll be more than an idle spectator in these threads, if the rumours are true. Incidentally how many games do you reckon Swansea would win in Europe, starting from the first round? I reckon the group stages of the Europa League if not the Champions' League would be a serious target, and maybe the latter rounds of the EL.
It was a bit before my time but I can vaguely remember us beating Sliema Wanderers by a hatful in a qualifying match once in the late 80s, and then losing 8-0 to Monaco a year or two before the exiles got booted out of Europe. Those were the days!![]()
"Life is like a hair on a toilet seat. Sooner or later you are bound to get pi$$ed off."
"In this league, a draw is sometimes as good as a win" - Steve Morison
Interesting one, that. Although how would the likes of Swansea get near Champions League competition through the Welsh Cup? Wouldn't they have to finish at least fourth in the English Premier League, being members of the English league structure? For what it's worth, I think these clubs would be daft to decline the invite if it opened up a realistic possibility of Europa League qualification for the winner.
Would they still be allowed to enter the FA cup, would seem daft if so - two bites of the cherry!?
The question about the CL was more of a hypothetical, though as you point out it would be possible if we could somehow win the Europa League! Hey, it's not impossible, look at Fulham and Middlesbrough getting to the final in the last decade.
I understand that if we were to re-enter Europe from the Welsh Cup we would be unable to qualify through the English system as the FA and UEFA would block it. But we're unlikely to do that anyway.
"Life is like a hair on a toilet seat. Sooner or later you are bound to get pi$$ed off."
"In this league, a draw is sometimes as good as a win" - Steve Morison
No, that's 100% not true. Only have to look at Sligo's 'promotion' due to Porto not using their 'holders' place in next years Europa.
54,321 sold - wws will never die - ***
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New blog if anyone's interested - http://loihistory.wordpress.com/
LOI section on balls.ie - http://balls.ie/league-of-ireland/
Metalurg won, so Glentoran won't be seeded
54,321 sold - wws will never die - ***
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New blog if anyone's interested - http://loihistory.wordpress.com/
LOI section on balls.ie - http://balls.ie/league-of-ireland/
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