TIERNAN LYNCH MAKES EUROPEAN GROUP STAGE PREDICTION AS HE WELCOMES INVER PARK RETURN

Tiernan Lynch believes an Irish League club reaching the group stages of a European competition is coming.

Linfield have come the closest in recent season after they agonisingly lost their Europa Conference League play-off to RFS on penalties two years ago. That same year Larne reached the third qualifying round of the Conference League before l osing 4-1 on aggregate to Portuguese outfit Paços de Ferreira.

This summer will see the Invermen play in Europe for the fourth season in a row and Lynch feels a Northern Irish club progressing to the group stages isn't "too far away". "I think it's coming, how soon it will be I don't know, but it is coming," said the Larne boss.

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"The league is just going from strength to strength. It's getting more professional, teams are getting better, clubs are getting better, managers are getting better...the professionalism is going through the roof. I don't think it's too far away."

Larne will be back in the Champions League qualifiers again this July with a victory in the first round strengthening their hopes of qualification to the group stages as they would drop into the latter qualifying rounds of the Conference League.

They came close to it last year as they took HJK Helsinki to extra time before eventually losing 3-2 on aggregate at Solitude.

Lynch felt if they had been able to play the game at Inver Park instead of having to relocate to Solitude they would have edged past the Finnish champions. "We actually felt a bit hard-done by the HJK game last year," he said.

"We definitely felt if we got them here at Inver we might have got a bit more out of it. I think it will be massive for us playing at Inver next season.

"Don't get me wrong I thought the crowd were brilliant at Solitude last year but home is home and getting the crowd behind you here will make a difference. I think the boys will be way more comfortable as well trying to do it here than anywhere else.

"When you get into Europe it's very much the luck of the draw. Hopefully we're better prepared this year than what we were last year."

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2024-05-01T21:40:07Z dg43tfdfdgfd