Dundalk lose their 4th consecutive match in the Europa League group stages to Rapid Vienna

Rapid Vienna recorded a comfortable 3-1 victory against Dundalk at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin on Thursday night in the Europa League.

For 11 minutes they kept their Austrian opposition on their toes and kept it tight. But at this level, it only takes a blink of an eye or in this case a little bit too much space to Christoph Knasmüllner who swung his right foot to hit a stunning strike into the top corner of the Dundalk net leaving Gary Rogers with no chance.

Dundalk had stayed steady since the goal giving as good as they got until the 37th minute when Thorsten Schick found too much space and time on the right and he crossed in an inch perfect ball to find Ercan Kara who headed home a bullet of a header to make it 2-0 at the break.

Dundalk switched formation and made three changes at the start of the second half. The changes seemed to make a difference for the hosts who won a penalty early in the second half when Kelly was tripped in the box after Barac lost the ball when trying to play out of the Rapid back four. Nathan Oduwa stepped up to take the penalty for Dundalk but shot wide of the goal to keep the scoreline at 2-0 to Rapid.

The contest however was ended in the 58^th minute when Kara hit an unstoppable shot from the edge of the box inside Rogers’ post for his second goal and Rapid’s third. Dundalk continued to fight hard for the rest of the second half and did get their reward with a second penalty which Chris Shields banged into the bottom corner of the Rapid net in the 63^rd minute.

The gap in class was there for all to see but once again Dundalk left the field with their heads held high and ready to go to Athlone on Sunday to try to book their place in another FAI Cup Final.

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