Dundalk heroes David McMillan and Robbie Benson are today basking in the ‘incredible achievement’ of the Lilywhites’ progress to the Champions League play-off round following the 3-1 aggregate win over BATE Borisov.
The Airtricity League champions had lost the first-leg 1-0 but overcame the deficit against their Belarusian opponents through a goal in either half from McMillan and a late third from substitute Benson.
Stephen Kenny's side now go into contention to face Celtic, Viktoria Plzen, Apoel Nicosia, Dinamo Zagreb, Ludogorets Razgrad and Olympiakos among others.
"We're not content with the Europa League we want to make the Champions League" - Robbie Benson
Dundalk are also assured of a windfall of €5.4million for reaching this point, while they would receive another €2million for just winning the play-off match and a massive €12million for reaching the group stages.
Dundalk also have the safety net of playing in the Europa League group stages even if they are eliminated at the next stage. They would have a minimum of six matches there with €360,000 for each win and €120,000 for each draw.
However, McMillan wasn’t thinking of the financial side when reflecting on the victory that gives Dundalk the chance to be the first Irish side to qualify for the Champions League group stages.
He said: “What an incredible night. It’s mad to think that just a week ago we were so deflated coming away from Belarus.
“But to turn it around here is just an incredible achievement and everybody deserves credit behind the scenes. I think this is great recognition for a lot of years of hard work.”
McMillan then hailed the contribution of Patrick McEleney, who came on for the injured Ronan Finn after 32 minutes, and set up Dundalk’s second.
“We made a couple of changes from last week and we knew we had very talented players on the bench that could come on if needed, or when needed really, and Patrick is an incredibly talented player,” continued McMillan.
“He was unlucky to miss out tonight but his attitude was brilliant and he knew his chance would come in the game, maybe earlier than expected, but he was brilliant when he came on.”
McMillan, who is top scorer in the Champions league so far this season, is now setting his sights on the group stages.
He said: “We’re just thankful we’ve another two games in the Champions League and secured at least the Europa League group stages, which is a fantastic feat, but we’d love to be in the Champions League group stages so we look forward to the draw now on Friday.
“Whoever we get we’ll give them a right test, give them a good go and hopefully we can get through,” he concluded.
Meanwhile Benson, who sealed the victory with a late effort, told the club's website: "It's tough to sum up, when you hear people say it will take a while to sink in, that's how I feel now.
"It's the best feeling I have had in football and the lads feel the same. We know that we have eight more games at least in Europe and that will go a long way.
"We're not content with the Europa League we want to make the Champions League.
"It's an incredible feeling, it's great for everyone, to be able to do it with this group of lads is an incredible feeling."
Fellow midfielder Stephen O'Donnell added: "Its an unbelievable achievement, we deserved it, we knew we couldn't play any worse than last week, it was crucial coming away with a 1-0 defeat and we played a lot more to our potential tonight and I think you've seen what we can do when we get it together.
"There's no superstars on this team, everyone is as good as each other."
