THE FOUR Irish clubs competing in the two European competitions this year will find out who they face in the opening qualifying rounds of the Champions and Europa Leagues today, with both draws to take place at Uefa’s headquarters in Nyon before lunchtime.

Bohemians are the sole Irish representatives in the Champions League and narrowly missed out on being one of the seeded teams in the 34-club second qualifying round.

The upshot is they could end up facing the likes of FC Copenhagen, Levski Sofia, Partisan Belgrade, Maccabi Haifa or Dinamo Zagreb in their second round games, which will take place on the July 14th or 15th and 20th or 21st.

At the other end of the scale, they might be drawn against one of the weaker seeded sides, with Iceland’s FH Hafnarfjordur, Inter Turku of Finland and Lithuanian outfit Ekranes Panevezys offering them the best prospects of progressing to the third round, at which stage a small number of league champions from middle ranking nations like Greece, the Czech Republic and Switzerland are added to the mix.

Under the new rules, non-champions effectively take part in a parallel qualifying competition, which starts at the third round stage, the draw for which will take place on July 17th when Celtic could be paired with Sparta Prague, FC Twente, Dinamo Moscow, FC Timisoava (Romania) or Sivasspor (Turkey) for the right to play the likes of Arsenal in the fourth round.

“The seeding doesn’t tell lies,” says Bohemians boss Pat Fenlon when asked about his own club’s situation. “The bottom three or four teams are probably ones you would like to play. But I know from experience they have all improved as well over the years. They will be two tough games, no matter who we get.

“I’ve looked at them all and they are all decent sides. It will be a tough game for us no matter who it is. But looking at it I think that will bring out the best in our players. They are really looking forward to it. They worked really hard last year to get this opportunity and there are some cracking teams in there. It should be very interesting.”

Such is the financial situation at the club there is a good deal at stake; a decent run in Europe would bring in much needed revenue and alleviate concerns about Bohemians’ ability to comply with the league’s 65 per cent salary protocol come the end of the season. Fenlon, however, insists making money for his employers is not the first priority.

“Financially, it’s a big game but I’m not interested in that – I just want to get through the round. I want to be able to pit our wits against a bigger team in the next round. But it will be difficult. There are some good sides in there. The quality of opposition is a massive step up.

“Hopefully the draw will be kind to us, though. The good thing is there are not too many places where you have to travel a long distance to play. That’s probably the best point about it. We have plenty of experience against teams from countries that are in the draw, so we’ll see what happens.”

The new rules are also intended to provide clubs from leagues like Ireland’s with a better chance of qualifying for the group stages and while Fenlon insists there have been negative aspects to the changes too, he acknowledges the new format is welcome.

“Under the other rules we’d never have a chance of getting to the group stages,” he says. “So it is a good initiative. We’ve got to look at that and try to be one of those five (the number of league champions from middle and lower ranking nations guaranteed a place in the group stages). But that’s very difficult. We’d just like to get through the first round and see how it goes then.”

In the Europa League, Sligo Rovers will be the first team into action from this country. Paul Cook’s side are the only one of three Irish clubs not to go straight into the second round, with the Showgrounds outfit seeded in the first round instead.

With the draw no longer sorted into geographical sections, they will face opposition from the likes of Estonia, Albania, Montenegro or, somewhat closer to home, Wales or Northern Ireland.

The games will be played on July 2nd and 9th.