Straight-talking Chris Shields admits he nonetheless has eyes on the large prize of Europa League group stage qualification — regardless of their midweek defeat to FC Zurich.
Goals from Aiyegun Tosin and Wilfred Gnonto imply David Healy’s troops face a frightening problem once they journey for the second leg of their Europa League third qualifying spherical tie on Thursday evening.
The Swiss aspect are actually favourites to fulfill Hearts in a Play-Off for the group phases, whereas the Blues will face both RFS of Latvia or Maltese outfit Hibernians in a Europa Convention League Play-Off, with the winners reaping the advantages of group motion.
Shields is aware of a factor or two about showing in European group phases, having been a member of the Dundalk workforce that reached that juncture of the Europa League in 2016.
And he repeated the feat in 2020, scoring from the penalty spot within the Lilywhites’ 3-1 defeat to Austrian giants Fast Vienna on the Aviva Stadium throughout a Group B marketing campaign that additionally took in memorable contests with Arsenal and Molde.
Though the Convention League is extra of a sensible purpose for the Blues, Shields definitely hasn’t thrown within the towel for the return leg towards the Swiss Champions.
“We should attempt to put the Convention League to the again of our thoughts,” he says.
“We will’t go in towards Zurich with an perspective of, ‘Now we have the protection internet of the Convention League to fall again on’.
“We knew there could be an enormous prize if we acquired previous the Champions League spherical one tie towards TNS.
“We must always have gotten extra out of the sport primarily based on how nicely we performed towards Zurich. We gave away two sloppy targets and it’s the previous cliché, you possibly can’t afford to do this at that stage.
“We restricted them to the 2 possibilities they scored. That’s what good groups do, they punish particular person errors and foolish errors.
“The primary purpose was like a scorching knife via butter. One way or the other the boy got here proper via the center of us. It was a bit disheartening as a result of I believed we began nicely.
“We saved them penned in, they didn’t see an excessive amount of of the ball.
“A sucker punch so early within the sport was fairly irritating. They're a cultured workforce. They play in a extra established League and their funds is far better than what we're used to.
“However I’m not massive on ethical victories. It’s no actual use to us if folks say we put it as much as a greater workforce. Personally, I believed we must always have come away from the sport with at the least a draw.”
Zurich introduced an estimated 400 followers to Windsor Park they usually made a deafening noise over the 90 minutes.
Shields insists he’ll be nicely ready for the return leg.
“I’ve skilled loads of noisy followers, given my time in European soccer,” he provides.
“I’ve had 30,000 Polish followers shouting at me in a warm-up.
“I believe I’ll be capable of deal with 20,000 Swiss followers shouting at me for 90 minutes, it’s all background noise on the finish of the day. It was good to see a partisan away assist, all of it added to the ambiance.
“As a participant, you don’t know what number of European video games you'll play over the course of your profession. They're added bonuses and everybody ought to relish them.”
After their first defeat at Windsor Park for 12 months — since they misplaced to Fola Esch within the Europa League qualifiers final 12 months — Shields believes Linfield can once more make the worldwide venue a fortress.
“We satisfaction ourselves on our residence file, particularly domestically,” he says. “Coming into the home season, we wish to hold that going.
“Our League season begins subsequent Sunday, so we’ll be trying to lengthen the file. We're harsh on ourselves to a sure extent, however probably not harsh on the identical time of our end result (towards Zurich)
“That is the extent of soccer we wish to be taking part in, so now we have to take some positives out of it. We’ll give it a crack subsequent week. If we are able to get an early purpose, you by no means know what can occur.
“We’ve seen many historic comebacks in Europe earlier than, so why can’t we be on the tip of 1?”