BK Häcken away

The Europa league second qualifying round saw Cork City paired with BK Häcken from Gothenburg, Sweden. It was the reward for eventually seeing off Linfield in the first round. City were away first and that first leg was last Thursday at the Bravida Arena on the island of Hisingen, northern Gothenburg. Our Swedish opponents made this competition by coming from 2-0 down in the national cup final to Malmö to win the trophy on penalties. 

With City in mid-season and on the back of two European games with Linfield we had the advantage of being slightly more match sharp. BK Häcken came into the game on the back of just one competitive game since the end of May. That game was a 4-2 success over Hammarby, a game I watched on a dodgy stream. BK Häcken looked a serious threat going forward with the likes of Paulinho, Nasiru Mohammed and John Owoeri standing out. Owoeri looking like a confident finisher with Paulinho and Mohammed looking threatening out wide. However they were guilty of giving away three penalties in that game, one of which was a blatant dive. Hammarby scored two of those penalties and had chances to level before the BK Häcken sealed the game in the final minute. It has to be said Hammarby were awful throughout. 

Two flights and I eventually arrived in Gothenburg last Wednesday. I was fairly optimistic about our chances in this game all week and was going with an away goal and a draw. Of course it would be nice to win the game and have more away goals but I thought a draw was well within reach. 

The game itself was the opposite of last year's disaster in Reykjavík. City played very well in that first half and were actively pushing the hosts. Half-time 0-0 things were going good. After the hour things would swing from going good to going fantastic. Ball was worked out to Stephen Dooley on the left he ran into the box and was clumsily taken down by Baba Mensah, penalty and Mensah red carded. In the last round both goals in the tie with Linfield were penalties by Sean Maguire. He stepped up and sent Peter Abrahamsson the wrong way, chants of "shit Casper Schmeichel" possibly putting him off. Winning with the away goal, twenty five minutes to play, dreamland. 

The hosts did get into the game after that. Being down a man didn't matter to them, they continued to knock the ball around and were eventually back on level terms when striker John Owoeri found the net with seven minutes to play. The game would end 1-1 and in many ways it was the perfect result but being 1-0 up so late in the game I was slightly disappointed at the end. 

Overall though a good result and well as you can see in the photo on the left I looked pretty pleased in the red jumper.