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Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
Sport
Paul Buttner

Stephen Bradley insists complacency won't be an issue for Shamrock Rovers ahead of second leg vs Hibernians

Shamrock Rovers boss Stephen Bradley insists there will be no hint of complacency from his side as they head for the heat of Valletta next week.

Goals from skipper Ronan Finn, the influential Dylan Watts and man-of-the-match Rory Gaffney gave Hoops a 3-0 first leg lead in their Champions League first qualifying round tie against Hibernians of Malta at Tallaght Stadium last night.

But Bradley knows it’s not over yet with Bulgarian side Ludogorets likely second round opponents as they hold a 2-0 first leg lead to bring to Montenegrins, Sutjeska.

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With Rovers already guaranteed €800,00 for qualifying, getting through would raise that to a minimum of €1.4 million and guarantee a Europa Conference League play-off slot at least.

At 3-0 down, Hibernians face an uphill task to reverse the tie.

But they proved a threat early in the second half when hitting the woodwork twice through sub Terence Groothusen and Thaylor.

“No, we're go to win,” said Bradley of any suggestion of simply defending their lead in the second leg in the Med.

“I think we saw in the second half that they’re dangerous.

“We knew the right winger was very, very quick. We thought the centre-forward would start. You saw he’s a monster and he can run. He’s a handful.

“If you sit back against them, they’re a big side and you’re asking for trouble.

“So, we know conditions, (artificial) pitch, all of that, we’ll go to win the game.”

And there will be no thoughts yet of who they might potentially meet in the second round and the additional momentary return.

“No, I can’t, I genuinely can’t,” said Bradley on putting that to the back of his mind.

“You saw in the second half that they can be dangerous. Do we fancy ourselves to go and win the game? Of course we do.

“We think we can go and improve again. Go to win the game.

“But we’ve got to make sure we respect them. I’ll let the people above me at the club look at other things.

“But for us, it’s focused on next week.”

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