IT’S SOFIA SO
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SERGE ATAKAYI’S remarkable life story took another positive twist at the Vasil Levski National Stadium in Sofia last night.
Atakayi (23) was the Supersaints’ supersub in the Bulgarian capital last night, his 87th-minute winner securing one of the best ever results in Europe by an Irish club.
The deserved victory means that if Tim Clancy’s side can do the business in Tallaght on Thursday, they will be in a play-off with Brondby or Basel for a place in the ECL group stages — and in for the €3m bonanza that goes with it.
“Tonight is a perfect night for us at Pat’s, we defended bravely and we took one of the chances that we got on the counter-attack,” said Saints boss Clancy.
Analyse
“It’s always different when you’re watching from the sidelines so we’ll watch the game back and analyse it, prepare for the game next week, see if we can pick up a few things that we noticed throughout the game.
“Certainly on the sideline there were a lot of hairy moments, balls into the box and we managed to defend them very well.
“But I still think at the other end of the pitch we had a few very good (right) opportunities where again the final ball or the final decision probably let us down.
“Certainly it gives us a little more belief going into next Thursday.”
Having dispatched Slovenian outfit Mura on penalties in the second qualifying round, this tie was seen as another step up for the Inchicore club.
But St Pat’s looked comfortable for most of this encounter and can have real hopes of progressing.
Had they been more clinical, they wouldn’t have had to wait until so late for their breakthrough.
But Atakayi, who joined the club less than three weeks ago, showed how it’s done — and what a time and a place to score a debut goal.
The striker claimed asylum in Finland as part of a youth side from the Democratic Republic of Congo that was playing in the 2010 Helsinki World Cup.
He became the youngest ever scorer in the Finnish top flight before moving to Rangers as a 17-year-old, then back to