CLIFTONVILLE begin their European campaign on Tuesday evening when they travel to Gibraltar to face St Joseph’s FC in the first round of the Europa Conference League.

The Reds returned to pre-season in the middle of June to prepare for their European exploits and have three friendly games under their belt, the most recent a 2-2 draw with Derry City in Joe Gormley’s testimonial game on Sunday before they began their travels to the Rock of Gibraltar.

Despite a shortened break due to the extension of the 2024-25 season in the Play-Offs, captain Rory Hale believes the squad are flying fit and ready for competitive action.

“It’s tough because you’ve a short window there, we probably started back later than we were expected to, but we had to,” he explained.

“The season finished so late for us into the middle of May, with those extra games – we played over 50 games last season. We had to have that extra wee break so we’ve been hammering the runs and to be fair to Mick he’s got us flying fit at the minute.

“We trained on Saturday, had the game on Sunday, we’ll train on Monday and hopefully we’re flying fit for the game on Tuesday," said Hale.

Opponents, St Joseph’s of Gibraltar are no strangers to Irish clubs in recent years, after defeating Larne in the 2022 Conference League at Inver Park and falling to a narrow defeat to eventual League of Ireland Champions Shelbourne last season.

Whilst Hale acknowledges he doesn’t know an awful lot about the opposition bar those results, he has no doubt that the Reds management will have the squad well versed on what to expect.

“I haven't [much research] personally but I've no doubt that Jim, Skin and Mick will have everything down to a tee,” he said.

“They will have the analysis ready for us and the clips ready for us. The only thing i know is that they ran Shelbourne close last year – they went on to win the League of Ireland –  so they obviously aren't a bad side and they lost the league on goal difference.

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“They must be a good outfit and solid, it’s going to be a real tough test for us but it was one of them games, they will be fancying themselves and we’ll be fancying ourselves”.

The 28-year-old missed out on European football last season after suffering an injury that side-lined him for almost three months but he is eager to make up for lost time with an added incentive of setting up the all-island clash with Shamrock Rovers in the next round should they progress.

“I love playing in Europe every single year, obviously last season I missed the two games against FK Auda because of injury so I’m definitely ready on a personal level to go out and put on a good performance,” Hale insisted.

“Hopefully we can win the tie because what a massive incentive to get Shamrock Rovers in the next round.

“It’s there for us if we want to go and do it, it’s only up to us. This group loves playing in the big games – we’ve had the experiences in the last couple of years. It’s a big incentive to go out and get a result.

“We want to be playing in big games and I want to be playing in big games, what a tie that could be with Shamrock Rovers”.

Kick-off is at 5pm GMT as the Reds begin their campaign on Tuesday evening in Gibraltar.

The event is being live-streamed via OneFootball at the price of £8.50 (€9.90) for supporters unable to attend the game, with the return leg at Solitude set for Thursday July 17th.