Tiernan Lynch’s players created history for the club at Inver Park on Thursday as they reached the Conference League play-offs for the first time with a penalty shoot-out victory over Ballkani.
Ballkani won 1-0 on the evening, cancelling out Larne’s victory in Prinstina by the same scoreline a week ago to take the tie to extra-time and a shoot-out.
Goalkeeper Rohan Ferguson was the hero, saving the first two spot kicks, while Joe Thomson, Andy Ryan and Mark Randall converted to hand Larne a significant advantage.
It left Chris Gallagher to score the winning penalty and record a 4-1 win in the shoot-out overall to book a spot in the next round where they will face Lincoln Red Imps of Gibraltar.
The first leg will take place in Faro on Thursday 22nd August, while the return leg will be at Inver Park on a week later.
The opening exchanges of Thursday’s tie were relatively quiet with Larne settling into the game well, having shots outside the box from midfielders Chris Gallagher and Joe Thomson which ended up well over the crossbar.
The first real opportunity came for Larne with 22 minutes on the clock, after some impressive link-up from the front two. Lusty fed the ball into Andy Ryan’s path and the Scotsman wriggled his way into a yard of space and stinging the palms of Enea Kolici.
Ballkani’s first opportunity arrived on nine minutes later. A surging run down the right flank by full-back Geraib Smajli was chested down by Sunday Adetunji into the path of Walid Hamidi and his low effort was well kept out by Rohan Ferguson.
Two minutes before half-time and Ballkani drew level on aggregate in what were fairly unfortunate circumstances for the home side. The ball broke across the edge of the box with Larne skipper Cian Bolger clipping the heels of forward Walid Hamidi, who was on the defender’s blindside.
Referee Robertas Valikonis immediately pointed to the spot and Hamidi dusted himself down to fire the resulting penalty into the top right corner to leave Ferguson with no chance.
The visitors almost forged ahead on aggregate straight away, but Adetunji’s looping effort was gathered by Ferguson at full strength.
Undeterred, Larne began the second half brightly and could have retaken the lead just three minutes into the new half, however, Dylan Sloan’s low drive from an acute angle was kept out by Kolici.
The goalkeeper was called into action just before the break when Lusty got on the end of an Ives knockdown, with his half volley from the edge of the box being palmed away by Kolici.
Ballkani were far from out of it however and Adetunji, who was back from suspension, brought a tidy save out of Ferguson on 65 minutes before Marsel Ismaljlgeci had a shot deflected narrowly wide.
With no further goals the game ticked into extra-time, with substitutes Bleart Tolaj firing a whisker wide at one end and Paul O’Neill’s header ending up on the roof of the net at the other before heading into the dramatic shoot-out.
Larne: Ferguson, S Graham, Cosgrove, Bolger, Donnelly, Ives (‘109 Want), Thomson, Gallagher, Sloan (’73 Randall), Ryan, Lusty (’73 O’Neill)
Subs: D Graham, Brown, Altintop, Devlin, Smith McKendry
Ballkani: Kolici, Smajli (‘101 Giovanni), Jashanica, Thaqi (‘120 Engjell), Queven (‘120 Dulaq), Hamidi, Adetunji, Emerllahu, Ismajlgeci (‘107 Sinani), Potoku, Kryeziu (’85 Tolaj)
Subs: Miftari, Ljuljanovic, Halili, Kodra, Abedini
Referee: Robertas Valikonis (Lithuania)
