DEREK McINNES, the Aberdeen manager, felt his team had given themselves a chance of passing through to the play-off round of the Europa League after claiming a narrow first-leg lead against the Cypriots Apollon Limassol.

Goals from Ryan Christie and Graeme Shinnie bookended an equaliser from Jander Santana to leave the tie in the balance ahead of the return in Larnaca next week. Aberdeen have gone out at this stage in each of the last three seasons but McInnes was not without hope this time after recording a narrow first-leg lead.

“It’s only half time but we are confident we can go over there and get the desired result,” he said. “It will be tricky. They are a very good side and we have to respect their qualities and we have to get the balance right between attacking and defending in Cyprus. But we are very capable and a lot of our best results have come away from home in Europe.

“We saw the best of my team in the opening half tonight. We were excellent. We saw what we are threatening to be this season with our intensity of play. We stopped a very good team from playing.”

Aberdeen were without Adam Rooney who missed the tie with a hamstring injury and McInnes revealed he would give the striker until the last minute to work on his fitness for the return.

“He is meant to be out for a week to 10 days but he has a chance,” he added. “We won’t take any risks in case the tear turns into something sinister. But he has a 50/50 chance of making it on the plane with us.”

There was praise, too, for Shinnie who delivered a captain’s performance capped with a spectacular winning goal.

“The winning goal from Shinnie was a deserved winner,” he added. “What a strike it was. There could not be any more love from our fans for him than they have already shown.”

Sofronis Avgousti, the Apollon manager who was sent off for celebrating his side’s equaliser, felt his team would have gone on to win had defender Esteban Sachetti not been sent off with 20 minutes of the game remaining.

He said: “I believe if it had stayed 11 against 11 we would have won the game. We were putting pressure on them at that time. And the player who was sent off was a key player so we missed him. Hopefully we will have him available in the next game.

“But it’s only the end of the first half in the tie. Next week we will play in front of a full stadium in Larnaca and our fans will hopefully give us their support so we can reach the next round.”