The New Saints bowed out of the Champions League as Cypriot side APOEL FC turned in a powerful second-leg display to book their place in the third qualifying round with a 3-0 aggregate victory.
It means the end of another European adventure for a Welsh club with eyes on the huge wealth of the group stages, but New Saints manager Craig Harrison said: “I am immensely proud.
“The second goal made it a huge ask and took the wind out of our sails. We had our chances, but that is me being ultra critical.”
The sides had drawn 0-0 at Park Hall last week and the Welsh side made it to the break in Nicosia unscathed.
However, Nektarios Alexandrou opened the scoring nine minutes after the restart when his deflected shot eluded goalkeeper Paul Harrison, before Pieros Sotiriou doubled the home side’s advantage with 17 minutes remaining.
Both the game and the tie were over deep into injury time when Tomas de Vincenti made it three from the spot to earn a clash with either Rosenborg of Norway or Sweden’s Norrkoping in the next round.
The going was even tougher for Northern Ireland’s Crusaders, who went down 6-0 to FC Copenhagen in Denmark to lose 9-0 on aggregate.
Former Cardiff City striker Andreas Cornelius, who scored in his side’s 3-0 victory at Seaview last week, helped himself to a double at Telia Parken with the Danes running riot.
Fellow frontman Andrija Pavlovic opened the scoring after 15 minutes and Andrew Mitchell’s injury-time own goal sent the home side in at the break cruising.
Cornelius struck twice either side of efforts from Rasmus Falk and Jan Gregus to complete a rout which will see Copenhagen go head-to-head with Romanian outfit Astra Giurgiu.
