Dundalk boss Stephen Kenny says their Champions League opponents BATE Borisov are a great example for Irish clubs.
The Belarusian champions have made it through to the group stages of the competition in five of the last seven seasons and they have built their “small-to-medium-sized club” in the right manner, according to Kenny.
He told RTÉ Sport: “I think they are a great example to all Irish clubs because they are a small-to-medium-sized club, really, yet they’ve punched above their weight.
“They beat Bayern Munich two years ago, they beat Atletico Bilbao in the group stages last season, they’ve had a string of outstanding results over in the last six or seven years, from where they’ve come from.
“They haven’t done it like Shakhtar Donetsk – bringing in four or five Brazilians players. They are indigenous players.
"They are all Belarusian, 14 players have been capped by Belarus. Obviously, they have one or two European players. They are a good example to all Irish clubs, I would feel.
“They’ve build a new stadium – by all accounts €48million and it’s only a 13,000-seater so you can see the benefits of their success in Europe and the revenue that it brings.”
"We’ve been in great form ourselves this season. We’ve won 20 games, drawn two and lost one" - Stephen Kenny
The Premier Division champions face BATE away in the first leg of the second qualifying round on 14 July and Kenny knows his side are up against it but is adamant that they are in a better position than last year.
“They probably had the highest co-efficient of all the teams we could have drawn, they’ve been in the group stages for five years of the last seven so they’ve great pedigree," he said.
“We’ve been in great form ourselves this season. We’ve won 20 games, drawn two and lost one.
“Players had some great European experience last season winning three games out of four, winning two away from home.
“I feel this group of players have had an outstanding season and a half to date and they are in good form so we are looking forward to that.
“From our point of view we have some players that wouldn’t look out of place at international level – I think Daryl Horgan, Richie Towell, Andy Boyle have really excelled over the last couple of seasons, still in their early twenties.
“And we’ve players with good European experience who weren’t available to us last year like Stephen O’Donnell, our captain, Ronan Finn and Gary Rodgers.
“We have a more experienced group than we had last season.
“We know BATE Borisov will be ranked overwhelming favourites to go through and they will be hoping they get to the group stages.
“But from our point of view there’s a massive incentive. We know if we win we take their seeding and we go into the next round.
“I think you’ve only got to win two matches to get into the group stages of the Europa League, three to get into the Champions League group stages.
“We have to be positive in our approach, we have to prepare well. We have to make sure we go to Belarus and we perform.”
The Louth side can draw on the fact that Bohemians, managed by Kenny at the time, met the Belarus side in the Champions League qualifiers in 2003 and came out on top, winning 3-1 on aggregate.
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