Stripes fail to make it
Gzira United wrote a golden chapter in their history yesterday as they qualified for the first round of a European club competition for the first time.
They fought back from a goal down in the 62nd minute to score twice through a Samb penalty and a Bilbao effort in added time to win the match 21. This was only their second participation in a European club competition.
They had only participated once 45 years ago when they were beaten 9-0 on aggregate by Brann Bergen of Norway in a first round tie.
Yesterday, they completed a 41 aggregate win over Andorran side Sant Julia to advance into the first round, where they will be meeting Radnicki Nis of Serbia.
In the first half, exchanges were more or less shared, but
KI Klaksvik Birkirkara 2 1
Birkirkara failed to make it yesterday in the Faroe Islands against KI Klaksvik, after losing the second leg 2-1 and were thus eliminated on a 2-3 aggregate.
The 1-1 draw at Ta’ Qali in the first leg seven days ago made it Gzira, inspired by the good form of Roderick Briffa, Andrew Cohen, Zach Scerri and Edison Zarate Bilbao created the best chances although they failed to find their opponents’ net.
The Maroons never gave the Andorrans a clear opportunity of goal, even if the Sant Julia side did their best to move upfield in search of a goal that would have given them hope of difficult for Paul Zammit’s eleven, even though they were surely the better team in the first leg.
But yesterday the Stripes needed a victory or at least a 22 draw to make it, with their goal only coming very late in the game and there was practically no more hope and time to make a dramatic comeback. recovering the 0-2 deficit from the first leg.
In the second half, Gzira appeared determined to take over, but it was the Andorrans who came back strongly in contention when they found the Gzira net just after an hour’s play.
But their joy and enthusiasm soon came to an end as Gzira were awarded an albeit controversial
KI Klaksvik took the lead just before the break through Deni Pavlovic, and doubled the score on the hour through Pall Klettskard.
Paul Zammit effected some changes with Edward Herrera, Stanimer and Zammit coming in for Micallef, Grech and Umeh.
Birkirkara did find the back of penalty which Samb converted in style.
From then on, the Maroons were back in command and not only scored a winning goal, but could have added more before the final whistle.
The Andorrans started on attack and in the 7th minute, Walter Lee had a low shot going wide.
Gzira’s reply arrived three the net for a consolation goal on 90 minutes thanks to a Marcelinho goal. It was too little late for the Stripes who thus made an early and unexpected exit from the competition.
K. Joensen, Simonsen, Pavlovic, MoellerIversen, Klettskard, Askham, Niclasen, Andreasen, Dosljak, Hadzibulic, Danielsen.
Birkirkara: Naumovski, Micallef (Herrera 61’), Mrsulja, Andjelkovic, Grech (Stanimir 73’), Eduardo-Manca, Mifsud, Fabiano, Attard, Marcelino, Umeh (Zammit 79’)
Kristoffer Karlsson (Sweden)
Deni Pavlovic 45’ (KI), Pall Klettskard 59’ (KI), Marcelinho 90’ (B)