ROBERTS: I COULDN'T HAVE ASKED FOR MORE

RHYL coach Osian Roberts was full of praise for his players tonight despite the 8-0 drubbing at the hands of crack Serbian outfit Partizan Belgrade.
"It's never nice losing and it sounded strange saying 'well done' to all the Rhyl players at the end of the match, but they deserved to be praised," Osian told Lilywhites Online.
"I couldn't have asked for any more. Of course they were a level above us and we knew that, but you're talking about a club who get 30,000 through the turnstiles every week, have just won their league by 19 points and have huge pressure on them to guarantee Champions League group stages this year due the money invested in the club."
Roberts said he has thoroughly enjoyed the experience of leading the Lilywhites against such illustrious opposition in Europe.
"I couldn't have wished to have worked with a better group of players. They made it easy for me really, and I hold them all in high esteem. They have represented Rhyl FC and the Welsh Premier League in superb style in my opinion, both on and off the field."
And as for lessons learned from playing a Partizan side packed with internationals and multi-million-pound stars?
"We had a good chat in the dressing room after the game," Roberts added.
"I said they'd learnt nothing about work rate, fitness or character, because they showed that in abundance. But we did agree to try and implement some of the movement we saw when in possession of the ball.
"Their movement to me was of international level. If the lads can incorporate this into their game then they'll step to another level this season and that's their challenge."
As for how he saw tonight's game himself, Osian added: "Partizan demonstrated their class as expected to win comfortably. However, Rhyl earned new support with their committment and character throughout.
"Our best moment was Neil Roberts' diving header which narrowly missed from six yards out following a flowing eight-pass move - had it gone in it would surely have brought the biggest roar of the night.
"Rhyl had plenty of possession and threatened often and scoring two or three goals would have been a fair reflection of the pressure we put on Partizan.
"Sherbon's volley from 20 yards shaved the right hand post, corners caused confusion in the box, Connolly had a drive blocked in the box, Strong's volley narrowly cleared the crossbar and Neil's diving header went agonisingly wide.
"The players will come home with a Partizan shirt and a lot of pride from these two ties."
Roberts added the Rhyl players had a tour of Belgrade in the morning and had walked around the historic fortress before entering the current fortress of Partizan.
Over 10,000 warmly applauded the Rhyl players as they left the pitch, a special moment which will live with the coach for many a year.