By Hibernian FC

The Lowdown

Our UEFA Europa Conference League adventure continues ahead of what could be a special night in Croatia for our third-round qualifying tie against HNK Rijeka!

The first leg at Easter Road was a close affair and after an intense, physical, attacking display, Jack Ross’ side came from behind to draw 1-1 thanks to a strike from Martin Boyle.

The game in Croatia on Thursday 12 August 2021 at the Stadion Rujevica, 7pm kick-off BST, will be our 100th European outing!

If we progress, we've been drawn against either Bohemians (Ireland) or PAOK (Greece) in the playoff – that’s one round away from the group stage. Bohemians won the first leg 2-1 at home.

We come into this match off the back of a 3-0 win over Ross County at Easter Road. An excellent performance saw Martin Boyle, Kyle Magennis and Christian Doidge get on the scoresheet.

How to watch

The match is being shown live on Premier Sports; CLICK HERE for more information.

Their coverage will start at 6.55pm over on Premier Sports 1.

International subscribers can also watch the game on Hibs TV as part of their subscription package.

Team News

Jack Ross made two changes to his starting line-up against Ross County as Josh Doig and Christian Doidge came into the side.

Doidge, however, replaced Kevin Nisbet, who missed out through injury. The Scotland international came off against HNK Rijeka last Thursday with a dead leg, which consequently meant he missed the game against Ross County. He could return to the side for the game out in Croatia.

Our head coach has no new injury headaches, so the key question is whether squad rotation is necessary due to the congested fixture calendar. Chris Cadden, Melker Hallberg and Sean Mackie are our only long-term absentees.

The Hosts

HNK Rijeka’s last outing was the 1-1 draw at Easter Road after their weekend HT Prva Liga (Croatia’s top-flight) fixture was postponed.

After that game their head coach, Goran Tomic, said: "I think we could have played the game a lot better. There were a lot of mistakes at the start of the game, we should have imposed ourselves more on the game. In general, we have an active result, but we can and must do better.”

Only home supporters are allowed inside the Stadion Rujevica for the second-leg and the Croatian side are expected to be playing in all white on home soil.

Like us, they have had a strong start to the season both domestically and in Europe, and have had strong success in European competition too in the past.

They’ve played 92 matches in European competitions, predominantly in the Europa League, making 68 appearances. They were in the group stages of the UEFA Europa League in 2013/14, 2014/15, 2017/18 and 2020/21. Rijeka have also featured in the Champions League on eight occasions, winning two qualifiers.

HNK Rijeka are the third-most successful Croatian football club, having won one Croatian First League title, six Croatian Cups and one Croatian Super Cup.