St Pat’s continue European journey in Tallaght Stadium

ST PATRICK’S Athletic return to the European stage on Thursday August 22nd when they play Istanbul Basaksehir in Tallaght Stadium, with a tip-off time of 7.45pm, reports Stephen Farrell.

In this UEFA Conference League play off, the Inchicore side will be hoping to build on their famous victory in the third qualifying round over Azerbaijani side Sabah last week, whom they defeated 1-0 away and so went through 2-0 on aggregate.

Pat’s successes in Europe are helping to attract large attendances, with over 4,000 seeing their home leg win over Sabah the previous week.

As well as being a South Dublin club, Pat’s also have a number of connections with the Tallaght area scoring their winning goals in the 90th and 95th minute respectively.

In their previous domestic league game they drew one all with Rizespor.

Pat’s boss and former Ireland manager, Stephen Kenny is a Tallaght native and the captain, Joe Redmond hails from Kilnamanagh and both will be very keen to progress further in the Conference League.

St Pat’s form of late has also been positive.

As well as their successes in Europe, they secured a one-all draw away with Galway United and a 3-2 victory at home over Sligo, both in the Premier Division of the League of Ireland, at the beginning of the month.

However Pat’s will have it all to do as Basaksehir have been showing good form recently.

The Istanbul club, which was only founded in 2014, beat Alanyaspor 4-2 in the Turkish domestic league on Sunday, to progress to this play-off tie Basaksehir beat Saburtalo from Georgia 2-0 in the second leg of their third qualifying round match and 3-0 on aggregate.

The Turkish side won their first league title in 2020 and have also seen Champions League action.

Progressing from the qualifying rounds of the Conference League has brought significant financial gains for St Pat’s.

The victory secured over Sabah brings to Stephen Kenny’s side a guaranteed minimum €1.275 million in UEFA prize money.