STEPHEN Kenny has warned his St Pat’s players they will have to fight for their lives in Europe.
Kenny had his side’s Conference League opponents Hegelmann Litauen watched in their 5-2 win over Siauliai on Saturday.
The Lithuanian outfit will be in Richmond Park on Thursday facing a Saints team that has not won for six matches, scoring just once in that run.
Last year, European football sparked an upturn in their form but boss Kenny is not assuming the same thing will happen again.
The Inchicore supremo, 53, said: “There’s no guarantees just because you did it before. We’ve got to fight for our lives.
“We definitely have to do that. And we’ve got to give everything of ourselves to get the victory that we need in Europe. And that’s what we must strive to do.
“And we have to come back in the league, our last two games are against Waterford and Sligo in the third phase.
“We must compete in those games as well. They’re very important games for us as well. We’ve got to get up levels.”
The ex-Ireland boss did highlight how he has had to make do without key players for long periods of time this season to explain in part why Pat’s lie sixth, 17 points behind Shamrock Rovers, when they were many people’s title favourites.
He said: “Listen, there are no excuses, everyone has their issues but the rhythm of the forwards . . . Aidan Keena started off like a house on fire. He got player of the month in the league, but he did a T-junction (hamstring) and was out for seven weeks with that.
“And we fired him in early enough then. But Mason Melia had his back issue and he needed three months off. Coming into the season, he didn’t really do a pre-season.
“And then had some osteopubis, which he missed three-and-a-half weeks with, and then we put him back in. So we haven’t been just getting that rhythm for the two main forwards, although they both scored six each and that’s up there.
“Then the creative players behind, Romal Palmer has been out for the whole season, more or less. And Chris Forrester was out for eight weeks.
“He came back, put himself in for a game against Waterford, but he wasn’t quite right and got re-injured. So overall, he was sort of eight weeks with that little cameo in between.
“Some people are incredible, like Zach Elbouzedi, or somebody like that. But different players find it harder to get to the level then when they come back.
“Players like Aidan and Chris, they can’t just come back after those periods, two months out and just turn it on again. It can be a challenge.
“But excuses are excuses. Putting the ball in the back of the net, you’ve got to do that regardless.
“And we’ve enough good players and we just hit a barren period. Sometimes that’s difficult to actually explain.
“But we just have to fight hard, dig in and give ourselves every chance on Thursday.”
DUBLIN HISTORY
Hegelmann manager Andrius Skerla was part of the Zalgiris side which won in Inchicore and knocked St Pat’s out of the Europa League in 2013.
He had previously played for Dunfermline in Scotland but that was before Kenny’s stint in charge there.
Kenny said: “He was very fondly remembered, he was a good player, yeah. But our paths never crossed.”
Hegelmann lie second in Lithuania’s A Lyga, six points behind leaders Kauno Zalgiris, with eight matches left to play. And wary Kenny is expecting a tough test in three days’ time.
He said: “They’re mid-season, they’ve players of different nationalities and they’ve done well. They play on an Astro Turf pitch, it’s a small ground and we have to adapt to that.
“But first of all is a home game here and we have to make sure that we’re ready. Lithuanian teams will always be very competitive, I feel. So we have to put in a strong performance on Thursday night.”
