COLERAINE SKIPPER STEPHEN O'DONNELL SAYS THE PROSPECT OF PLAYING IN EUROPE IS 'A CARROT' FOR THE BANNSIDERS AS THEY GET READY FOR CRUSADERS SHOWDOWN

The winners will guarantee themselves a six-figure sum and join Larne, Linfield and Cliftonville as the Irish League's European representatives in the summer.

The men from the north coast put the Glens to the sword in a comprehensive 3-0 win at The Oval, whilst Crusaders saw off the challenge of Carrick Rangers at home.

O'Donnell said that competing on the European stage is a major "carrot" for the players on the Ballycastle Road, who last featured in Europe in the 2020/21 campaign.

"Monday is as big as it comes. Playing in Europe is one of the pinnacles of what we can achieve here. Having not played in Europe for a couple of years the hunger as players is definitely there," he said.

"The carrot is there to go and win on Monday and we know what the rewards are. We want a summer where we are playing two legs against a European team and trying to get through a round and having that real enjoyable summer.

"We make no bones about it, the season hasn't been good enough, we haven't won enough games and we've dropped too many points, against the bottom six sides in particular we haven't got the results we wanted.

"The gaffer never swayed from the plan and the goal. The goal was to get into Europe, we haven't achieved anything yet, but to put ourselves in the position to get there when it looked very unrealistic a few months ago is pleasing.

"So given how far we've come and what we've done we're delighted to be where we are, but again if we don't win on Monday it will be a disappointing season."

Coleraine's semi-final win was their first ever play-off victory at the fifth attempt, with the Bannsiders unbeaten at Seaview in their two Premiership matches in north Belfast this season.

O'Donnell added: "We have been really disappointed with our record in the play-offs, I can think back to some good performances but poor results.

"I can think back to Cliftonville a few years ago when James McLaughlin scored that hat-trick then we got that shocking refereeing decision.

"To win the semi-final is job done but there's no pat on the back or no reward because if you're beaten on Monday then it's completely irrelevant.

"We just dust ourselves down again and go on Monday and it's something to really look forward to.

"The Crues are a good side, we saw that when we played them a couple of weeks ago albeit both clubs made a lot of changes on the day.

"We've had two big performances up there already this season. We won one and drew the other despite playing with 10 men for a long time, so there's a lot for us to take from those performances.

"We know they're a top side with top players and any given day they can roll teams over, and we've been on the receiving end of that before.

"If we can go out and put in another performance like we did against Glentoran we'll not be a million miles away."

2024-05-05T10:10:18Z dg43tfdfdgfd