The bars around the Riazor stadium were already full of the home side's celebrating supporters last night when the door of the Shelbourne dressing room finally opened. Inside, there was despair that what had initially been such a strong performance had gone unrewarded and dismay that the visiting team would be judged on the basis of a three goal defeat that nobody from the Dublin club felt was a fair reflection of the game they had just played.

"The lads are completely gutted back there," said Shelbourne skipper Owen Heary. "To lose by three goals like that is a awful, we really didn't feel they were three goals better that us and a lot of heads went down at the end." The right back went on to admit, however, that the visiting side could have no complaints about Victor's opening goal on the hour. "We played well until then, felt that we'd done a lot of good things but when you make schoolboy errors that this level you're going to get punished for it and that's exactly what happened.

"After that I felt we were a bit hard done by. There wasn't much we could have done about the second or third goals, they were both great efforts, and I thought we did well enough to come away from the game will a little but more than that." The Dubliners don't have muchg time to lick their wounds after the defeat, After returning today they must prepare for Saturday's FAI cup replay in Derry and before that there is tomorrow's UEFA Cup draw to keep an eye on.

"We've always said that the league and cup are the copmpetitions we have to concentrate on because they're the ones we are capable of winning. I thik after tonight the lads will be determined to win the league again so we can get back into this competition and maybe improve again on what we've done this year.

"But we've still got the UEFA Cup and if we get a good draw in that then who knows what we might still achieve in Europe this season. The important thing is to pick ourselves up, learn what we can from tonight and then move forward." Pat Fenlon criticised the referee, saying that the match official had "hangled things poorly," over the course of the 90 minutes.

"What I was sent off for was ludicrous, I just made the point that (Juan) Valeron had dived and Stuart Byrne (who was booked for the challnge) was nowhere near him. But we weren't beaten by the referee, we were beaten a very good team." Jason Byrne, meanwhile, admitted to being bitterly disappointed that he failed to take any of the three chances that came his way over the course of the 90 minutes. "The lob in the second half is the most disappointing, though. The two before half time were tougher but I would have expected to score that normally."