What a night it was in Vaduz, with the fairytale year for the Swifts continuing on the road in Liechtenstein.
The victory over FC Vaduz was the first time a Dungannon side has won away from home in a European competition, and only the second ever win in Europe in either leg. It was also a first success in the relatively new UEFA Conference League competition.
An hour before kick-off, the Swifts revealed a more defensive side, and manager, Rodney McAree discussed his thinking post-match.
“It’s not a shape I like to be honest, I’m not a fan of playing three at the back, so if we change that for our home game…. we will have to look back at the match, we will have to see how certain things went, and then we will assess and go from there. “
After kicking off in the Rheinpark Stadion, the home side immediately piled on the pressure, and continued to do so for the first 20 minutes of the contest. Were there some nerves among the Swifts players?
“I’m not sure whether it was nerves, I think it was more eagerness,” Rodney said.
“I think it was more everybody was so eager to do well, to impress, and to carry out their responsibilities, that they ended up trying to do more, which they don’t have to. We got a lot of results last season through organisation and knowing what we were doing. Ultimately whenever we got our plan tonight correct, it probably paid off for us.”
Despite all of this early threat, the back five, which consisted of Adam Glenny, Cahal McGinty, Caolan Marron, Danny Wallace and Steven Scott, handled all of this pressure extremely well, being resolute in defence, and only limiting Vaduz to a couple of shots at keeper Declan Dunne. He made a standout save 11 minutes in, when Stephan Seiler picked up a loose ball in the middle of the D, only for Dunne to save it on his left-hand side.
The Swifts grew into the game, creating their first chance with 23 minutes on the clock, after a Kealan Dillon free kick found the head of Cahal McGinty, only for Caolan Marron to then put it wide of the post.
The best chance of the half fell to the visitors on 39 minutes, when new signing Tiernan Kelly capitalised on a defensive mistake, and slipped the ball through to Sean McAllister, only for his shot to strike the outside of the Vaduz goalkeeper’s near post.
As the second half kicked off, Vaduz continued to enjoy more of the possession, and in the 54th minute, they got their second corner of the half.
Attacking full back Mischa Beeli whipped in a corner towards the near post of Declan Dunne’s goal, which found the head of Andrew Mitchell, who headed it out into the middle of the pitch. Midfielders Kealan Dillon and Ronaldo Dantas Fernandes battled for the loose ball, with the Swifts player sending it up the pitch. Sean McAllister controlled with is head, and 40 yards from goal, spotted the Vaduz goalkeeper out of his area, and attempted the spectacular, and after what felt like an eternity for the travelling supporters, the ball dropped into the Vaduz goal and it was 1-0 to the Swifts.
“I just remember flicking it down with my head, and I just saw the keeper off his line, and I just thought I may as well go for it”, said the goal scorer.
McAllister came through the ranks at Dungannon before heading to Everton and Rodney said: “I’m sure he wondered if coming to Dungannon Swifts was the right opportunity. I don’t want to keep hold of Sean McAllister, I want to lose Sean McAllister, I want him to go back across to England and become a full time footballer again, and that’s our ambition as staff to help Sean to achieve that, and if he doesn’t achieve that, he’s going to be a hell of a player for us, because he has been fantastic since he has come through the door.
He’s athletic, he’s strong, he knows where the net is, he has scored in quite a few of the games he has played so far, his finish tonight was exceptional, without singling Sean out, everyone was marvellous, but Sean deserved his goal.”
The rest of the second half brought few chances at either end, with the resolute Swifts defence limiting the Vaduz forwards to wayward shots and half chances. Any crosses the Liechtenstein side produced were expertly headed away by the three centre backs in the middle, all having outstanding games.
Rodney made a number of substitutions during this half, bringing in Leo Alves, James Knowles, Tomas Galvin, Thomas Maguire and Peter Maguire. These fresh legs were priceless in seeing out the game.
The final minutes felt like an eternity for the Swifts fans who travelled in their numbers, with excess of two hundred making the trip to Zurich and then on to Vaduz, the capital of Liechtenstein, until the referee blew his final whistle, leaving the supporters in fantasy land, taking a 1-0 advantage and another slice of history back home.
Regarding the travelling support, Rodney said:
“I think it’s amazing, I was actually lying on top of the bed this afternoon, and I actually had a little bit of a tear because I was watching the supporters down the street, and I was looking at photos, and this is Dungannon Swifts, and we are in Vaduz, in Liechtenstein, and there’s two hundred of them here, a few years ago we were going to Irish league grounds, and we were bringing twenty or thirty supporters.
What the Spirit of ‘49 has done is absolutely unbelievable, to see them there before the game today, to see their jubilations and their joy and the happiness on their faces, we’ve made it a great trip away to Liechtenstein, and we’ve made it even better with the result.”
Here is Rodney’s assessment of the first leg:
“In the early stages of the game, I thought we gave Vaduz too much respect, we allowed them to move us about, they are a very good team, they play good football, they get into good areas, and we were probably too eager, we needed to be patient, we needed to show more composure whenever we didn’t have the ball, and back what we were trying to do in terms of being hard to be broke down, and I think when we got our shape a little bit more, we were a little bit more patient without the ball, I thought we did quite well.”
“We understand that we are only at the halfway point, but you would much rather go home with a 1-0 win than a 1-0 defeat, so we have to enjoy it at this moment in time.”
The goalscorer said:
“It was tough, the first fifteen, twenty minutes, it took us a while to get into it, settle our heads, get into it, and it was just more trying to get close to them, not letting them play around us, and once we settled into it, we did very well.”
“It’s been unbelievable, since I’ve came into it, I’ve enjoyed every second of it, and this is what I’ve been looking forward to the most.”
The Swifts are back in action at Stangmore Park this afternoon in a friendly against championship side, Institute, and then next Thursday in the all-important second leg against F.C. Vaduz in Solitude, the home of Cliftonville.
Dungannon Swifts F.C. – Dunne, Glenny, McGinty, Marron (P. Maguire 82’), Wallace, Scott, Dillon (Knowles 56’), Bigirimana (C), Kelly (Alves 56’), Mitchell (Galvin 75’), McAllister (T. Maguire 82’).Unused Substitutes – Henderson, Glass, J. Scott, King, Bermingham, Boyd, McAleese.
F.C. Vaduz – Schaffran, Berisha (C), Simani, Schwizer, Seiler (N. Hasler 85’), Monsberger (Navarro 79’), Beeli, Mack, Eberhard, Cavegn (Campos 66’), Dantas Fernandes (De Donna 79’).
Unused Substitutes – Buchel, Ohri, A. Hasler, Hoxha, Hammerich, Lang.
Stadium – Rheinpark Stadion.
Official Attendance – 1,138.