Proud Saints Go Down Fighting As Glorious European Adventure Ends:
By: Aidan Crowley:
Istanbul Basaksehir: 2. St. Patrick’s Athletic: 0.
(Istanbul Basaksehir win 2-0 on aggregate).
Despite a battling performance and a number of gilt-edged scoring opportunities, Saint Patrick’s Athletic crashed out of contention in their UEFA Europa Conference League Play-Off Round (Qualifying Round 4), second-leg clash against top Turkish side, Istanbul Basaksehir, at the Basaksehie Faith Terim Stadium, Istanbul, yesterday (Wednesday 28th August).
Under the guidance of manager, Stephen Kenny, the Saints held out, staunchly, for sixty-four minutes. However, their dream of competing in the group stages of this prestigious European competition for the first time was shattered when second-half goals from Omer Ali Sahiner and Olivier Kemen sent the home side through to the next round.
With St. Pat’s poor domestic form in the League of Ireland, so far, this season, this tie represented a golden opportunity to gain experience and financial rewards at a top European level. To add to their woes, the Saints finished the match with only ten men, after substitute Aaron Bolger received a straight red card for a robust challenge on Kemen.
Sixteen-year old prodigy, Mason Melia and Kian Leavy had two clear cut chances to put the visitors ahead before the break. However, the hosts enjoyed the better chances, overall, in front of the 6,160 home fans and the 100 Saints fans, who made the pilgrimage to the edge of Europe.
Early on, St. Pat’s striker, Zach Elbouzedi, opened up a pocket of space on the edge of the box. The shot appeared to be on. However, the ex-Ireland Under-21 international squared across to Melia, who was perfectly positioned in front of goal, but the striker’s shot was tame.
Minutes later, Krzysztof Piatek, capped thirty times for Poland, saw his crisp header zip over Joseph Anang’s goal, as the hosts began to hit their stride.
Basaksehir tried to find their forwards through a series of long balls, but the St. Pat’s back line, led by skipper, Joe Redmond, held firm. Then, on twenty minutes, Greek international, Dimitrios Pelkas, torpedoed his effort high and wide.
Another lung-bursting run by Elbouzedi down the right wing got the Saints moving again. The winger’s cross was diverted, before Leavy, the only team sheet change from the first-leg, saw his follow-up effort well blocked.
Then, on twenty-five minutes, Leavy capitalised on an error and charged down on goal, unfortunately, scuffing his attempt wide. However, the Saints were now beginning to find some joy on the counter attack.
Minutes later, the Turkish outfit now began to up the ante, going close to taking the lead, not once, but twice. Firstly, midfielder, Berkay Ozcan rounded Anang, only to see his effort bravely cleared off the line by Saints right-fullback, Axel Sjoberg, who painfully collided with the post in the process.
Kemen then unleashed a goal-bound shot, only to see it blocked by his own player, Piatek. That represented two warning signs in the space of two minutes for the Inchicore side.
Five minutes before half-time, Anto Breslin appeared to block Dimitris Pelkas’ driving shot with his arm, but the Hungarian referee dismissed the pleas for a penalty from the home side. Then, Ghana international, Jerome Opoku, tried his luck in front of goal, but to no avail, leaving the score an evenly balanced 0-0 at the break.
St. Pat’s had performed brilliantly to hold back the tide, but just after the hour mark, the host’s broke the deadlock. Basaksehir captain, Sahiner, slipped in behind the Saints backline, courtesy of a deflection and struck the ball past Anang, which was the first goal that Kenny’s men had conceded in 334 minutes of European football.
Matters went from bad to worse for the visitors, seventeen minutes later, as Bolger was red-carded for hacking Kemen to the ground in an attempt to prevent a counter attack.
Then, with the next attack, the hosts doubled their advantage when Kemen headed home his side’s second goal from Lucas Lima’s superbly-judged cross.
The best chance of the night for the Saints came after four minutes of added time, when Brandon Kavanagh hit a powerful, low, strike on the run, connecting with a pinpoint cross from the left. However, Basaksehir ‘keeper, Muhammed Sengezer, reacted brilliantly, getting his body behind the ball to make the save.
With that, St. Pat’s glorious European adventure came to a shuddering halt, for another year. The Saints have only three days to recover from their UEFA Europa Conference League exertions, as they resume League of Ireland duties, with a home match against Drogheda United on Sunday (1st September) (kick off 6.00 pm).
“We’re hugely disappointed to go out. Obviously hugely disappointed. You’re obviously going to be up against it here, we were under no illusions. But over the two legs, the players were absolutely excellent. We’ve probably deserved to win last week”, said Kenny after the match.
“Tonight, you’re going to concede possession at times because they force you back with their inverted full-backs and the runs they make. But we’ve two great chances in the first half, we didn’t capitalise on that. We probably needed to. Halfway through the second half, it’s nil-nil, still in the balance. They’ve taken the lead and the sending off hasn’t helped us with the second goal. We’re still in the game at 1-0, as we saw with Brandon Kavanagh’s late chance”, he continued.
“It’s difficult to analyse because we’re so gutted about tonight. They’ve been brilliant against Vaduz, to score five goals, unbelievable. Two clean sheets against Sabah and they go through. A highly regarded team, Euros 12 million budget, a really serious team”, he added.
“Tonight, you see by the celebrations here, the relief of getting over the line against us. Because they know that over 180 minutes, they’ve been in a really tough tie between the two legs”, he concluded.
A visibly disappointed, Jamie Lennon, stressed afterwards that while they faced long stretches out of possession in Istanbul, they were still right in the mix, until the late sending off.
“ I thought at half-time, they might have had the bulk of possession, but I thought we had the two best chances early on in the game. We came in at half-time, spoke about how we were still well in the game”, said Lennon.
“Even when we went 1-0 down, we’re still hopeful we can get another chance, because we’ve proven we can get chances against them. But once the sending off happens, it becomes much more difficult after that”, he added.
“A tough one to take in the end”, he concluded.
Istanbul Basaksehir: Sengezer; Duarte (Kemen 7), Gureler, Opoku, Sahiner (C) (Ozdemir 76); Pelkas (Lima 77), Ergun, Ozcan; Piatek (Keny 77), Davidson (Figueiredo 70).
St. Patrick’s Athletic: Anang; Sjoberg, Redmond (C), Grivosti, Breslin; Lennon, Forrester (Bolger 77); Mulraney (B. Kavanagh 77), Leavy, Elbouzedi (Kazeem 88); Melia (Keena 68).
Referee: Balazs Berke (Hungary).
https://solidsport.com/stpatricksathletics/watch/istanbul-basaksehir-st-patricks-athletics
