The healthy haul of goals in his first full season of top flight football, not least the two against Rosenborg, he remembers well. The problem for Richie Foran as he prepares to embark on another campaign with Shelbourne, is that there was also plenty about last season that is best forgotten.

While the goals marked him out as one of the league's brightest prospects they ended up being overshadowed by the five sendings off, another in a Gaelic football match he wasn't supposed to play and, finally, his expulsion from the Irish under-21 squad.

The fall out with Don Givens, after he missed a curfew, also cost him a move to Aberdeen. That, he insists, however, may yet turn out to be a blessing in disguise.

"For a start, what they were offering wasn't all that great and if they hadn't improved it I probably wouldn't have gone anyway," he said yesterday as he stood in the driving rain at the Brondby training complex 20 kilometres outside Copenhagen.

"And I've always said that I'd be happy to spend the rest of my career with Shelbourne. I believe this team is good enough to finish in the top six in Scotland, so I'm not missing out on anything really by not having gone to Aberdeen." That's not to say that the 21-year-old has completely given up on a move away. "After what happened I might as well forget about the Ireland thing," he concedes, "but if I keep scoring the goals then there's no reason that someone else won't come in for me, maybe someone a bit bigger than Aberdeen."

If he is to catch the eye of a manager at the sort of club he would like to work then tonight's game could give him the ideal stage. Foran scored 12 league goals last season but it is the two against Rosenborg that convinced Dermot Keely that the youngster was ready for a prolonged run in the first team.

The Dubliner remains a raw talent in many ways but he certainly possesses strength, pace and an instinctive ability to score goals. The combination was enough to convince Ebbe Skovdahl, the Aberdeen coach who used to be in charge here at Brondby, of his worth. There's no doubt that, when he returned with his new side for a pre-season friendly a few weeks ago, Skovdahl will have drawn the attention of successor, Aage Hareide, to the threat the striker is capable of posing.

Doubts, as they say, remain about his temperament, however, and Foran acknowledges that his ability to contain the use of his elbow over the coming season might be just as important to his future as his gift for using his feet.

Friendly and talkative, it's hard not to believe him when he says that he is reformed but tonight's game may give an early indication of how he is maturing. The Brondby defence is big, capable and experienced and Foran may have to show cleverness beyond his years if he is to get any change out of his markers.

If he gets even one goal then Skovdahl may regret getting involved in another manager's problem while others in the business will presumably take note.

The manager most immediately affected, though, will be the one who has kept faith with the striker through all of the last year's difficulties, the one who clearly still believes that Foran's follies will end up as no more than a footnote in a much greater footballing story.