Lille give Shelbourne reasons to be cheerful

UEFA Cup/First round draw: Shelbourne officials reacted with cautious satisfaction yesterday after the club was drawn against French side Lille in the first round proper of the UEFA Cup.

For the purposes of the draw the Dubliners had been placed in a group of 10 clubs that also included Italian giants Lazio, Turkey's Besiktas and Hearts of Scotland and while club chairman Finbarr Flood conceded that one or two of these looked more attractive prospects he acknowledged that the pairing could have been a lot worse too.

"I think on balance we probably would have wanted Hearts because we'd know a bit about them and, to be honest, we'd have fancied our chances a bit," he said. "But considering we could have been going to Austria or Turkey, Lille isn't a bad draw at all for us.

"The hope is that we'll do well enough out of it with French TV," he added, "although we probably won't know for sure for a few days and we got the home draw first so we're certainly not complaining.

"We're not sure about whether we should look to move the game, or even whether Lansdowne would be available, but we'll figure all of that out by the start of next week."

Quite how large a draw the French club will prove to be is hard to gauge but they certainly don't possess the pedigree of Deportivo La Coruna.

They have, though, acquitted themselves well recently when in European competition. Three years ago they reached the last eight of the UEFA Cup and 12 months later they made the group stages of the Champions League when they failed to make it out of a group which included Deportivo, Manchester United and Olympiakos.

Last year was a disappointing one for the club; they could manage no better than a 10th-place league finish and exited their cup competitions early.

Claude Puel's side are faring a little better on the domestic front this season with a win, draw and defeat in their opening three league matches leaving them 13th in the table. They have done well in the Intertoto Cup, beating Leiria of Portugal after extra-time in one of the three finals to qualify for this stage of the UEFA Cup.

The club has several impressive young players but few major stars and their leading scorer from last season, Vladimir Manchev, who played for Bulgaria in Dublin earlier this month, has just been sold to Levante for €2.5 million.

Shelbourne manager Pat Fenlon expressed confidence yesterday: "If we do our homework then we will have a good chance of progressing. We've learned a lot from our games in Europe so far and we will bring that to these games."

He insisted, however, that he would not be giving any real thought to the outcome of the draw until this evening's FAI Cup third-round replay against Derry City is out of the way.

The Dubliner has a full squad available to him for tonight's game at the Brandywell but could opt to make a couple of changes to his starting line-up after what will have been a tiring week for his players.

Derry manager Stephen Kenny, however, insists he expects a tough game with Shelbourne's record in domestic outings after European games providing little support for the theory they will be vulnerable.

"They'll be coming here to play in front of a big crowd and they'll be keen to get through so we're expecting it to be tough," he says.

Kenny is unlikely to make any dramatic changes to the Derry line-up that performed strongly at Tolka Park last week.

Peter Hutton, however, is in contention for a return, particularly if Paddy McLaughlin's slight knee problem ends up ruling him out. Definitely out of contention are Mark Farren (hamstring) and Kevin Deery (back).

Meanwhile, the team that Flood admitted he would have liked Shelbourne to have drawn, Hearts, will play SC Praga of Portugal in their UEFA Cup tie. Also travelling to Portugal for their second-leg game will be Rangers, who drew the Madeira-based side Maritimo.

Perhaps the most intriguing tie of the draw sees Premiership side Newcastle United play Hapoel Bnei Sakhnin, the first Arabic side to represent Israel in the UEFA Cup first round. Middlesbrough drew Banik Ostrava of the Czech Republic while Championship side Millwall take on Hungary's Ferencvaros.