A brilliant second-half hat-trick from Sean Maguire saw Cork City through a potentially difficult evening as John Caulfield’s men beat Levadia Tallinn 4-2 to complete a 6-2 aggregate victory.
It was a tense atmosphere in front of a bumper 6,314 on Leeside, where a 2-1 interval deficit went against the expectations of a comfortable win many had after a well-earned 2-0 victory in Parnu a week ago.
However, things didn’t go quite to script in the opening period, as Evgenii Kobzar fired the visitors into the lead after 15 minutes and, after Karl Sheppard’s equaliser seemingly settled things, a controversial second for the Estonians saw City behind at the break.
It looked clear that Kobar had controlled a long ball with his left arm, right in front of assistant referee Johann Gudmundsson, but with no whistle coming he easily beat Ryan Delaney and crossed for the incoming Nikita Andreev to head home.
City had had a few chances to open the scoring, with Kevin O’Connor’s swerving shot forcing Sergei Lempets to cover in the Levadia goal as it flew just wide of the post.
However, the second half was the Sean Maguire show, as the Kilkenny native showed once again why he’s rated so highly in these parts; a deft flick settling City nerves and restoring parity just 36 seconds after the restart.
Andreev had a half-chance to make things awkward with a quarter-hour remaining but his low effort was off-target, and after Achille Campion’s knock-down, Maguire powered through a flimsy defence to fire home his fifth European goal in Cork City colours, a new club record.
On a record-breaking night the former West Ham man headed home a corner soon after, City’s first European hat-trick, and the most amount of goals scored in a European game.
Next up for Caulfield's side is a likely tie against Cypriots Larnaca, who took a 5-0 lead into their second leg against Gibraltar's Lincoln Red Imps.
Cork City: M McNulty; J Keohane, C McCormack, R Delaney, K O’Connor; G Morrissey, G Bolger (A Campion 85); K Sheppard (S Beattie 68), G Buckley, S Dooley (S Griffin 78); S Maguire.
Levadia Tallinn: S Lempets; I Dudarev, A Artjunin, M Podholjuzin, A Gando; J Krznarić, M Roosnupp; N Andreev, J Morelli, E Kobzar (P Marin 60); R Hunt.
Referee: G Jónsson (ISL).
