The team from the Lithuanian capital made crude mistakes at the start of the second qualifying round away from home and lost 0:3 to their opponents from Georgia, who scored all three goals in the first half-hour of the match.
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This means that in the return leg a week later, Andrius Skerla’s protégés will need to win by at least a three-goal margin to keep their hopes alive of extending their European season into August.
Although the scoreboard showed a crushing victory for his team, the Georgian journalists found the “Dinamo” coach dissatisfied after the match.
“I have no right to say that I am dissatisfied. The guys played a fantastic match,” Temur Ketsbaia denied. “Today we took a big step towards reaching the third round and got closer to the conclusion of this tie.”
Nevertheless, the Georgian was in no hurry to jump to conclusions, reminding that the return leg would be played on the artificial turf of “Žalgiris'” home stadium.
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“The return leg in Vilnius is still ahead, where there will be artificial turf. We simply could have scored more goals, and the opponents also created dangerous chances. However, this was only the first half, so now we are waiting for the return match. This result does not mean that everything is over yet,” said T. Ketsbaia.
The 58-year-old specialist, who previously coached the national teams of Cyprus and Georgia, as well as the Olympiacos Piraeus team, also named one of the reasons why “Žalgiris'” defensive fortifications collapsed.
“There was not only aggression on the field – there was also good football. We tried to continue this game in the second half as well. Unfortunately, we couldn’t score more goals after the break, but at least we didn’t concede any ourselves. I am glad that the legionnaires are helping to achieve results. That is why “Žalgiris'” defense did not play as it should have today,” said the “Dinamo” coach.
The return match between the teams will be played on July 30 at 8 PM.
