MOTHERWELL'S European adventure ended, as expected, last night as Stuart McCall's youthful side went down to Levante.
The Fir Park club did so, however, with a sense of pride at managing to avoid a whitewash at the hands of a team that finished sixth in La Liga last season.
Fearing a more brutal ending to this season's European exertions, Motherwell bowed out of the competition with their heads held high as they battled hard to contain their hosts to a 1-0 victory in the Europa League play-off second-leg.
After being eliminated from the Champions League qualifying rounds at the hands of the Greek side Panathinaikos in comprehensive fashion, Stuart McCall no doubt feared a similar outcome from his players' efforts to reach the group stage of the Europa League. Having lost the first-leg at Fir Park 2-0, without getting close to the Levante goal, they made this journey in hope not expectation.
Motherwell travelled without a handful of first-team regulars, paving the way for kids with limited experience to take their place, was most hardly ideal for such a test. With Shaun Hutchison, Tom Hateley, Nicky Law and Simon Ramsden all back in Scotland, it was left to teenagers Fraser Kerr, Adam Cummins, Steven Hetherington and Stuart Carswell to fill the void; quite simply, there were no other options open to McCall.
The game was just a few minutes old when Motherwell thought they conjured a goal, Michael Higdon arriving at the back post to head a Hetherington free-kick into the net only to see it ruled out. "I'll have to see it again, but I don't think he was offside," McCall said.
In what was a bright opening from the visitors, Jonathan Page was picked out shortly afterwards from another Hetherington set-piece, however, the defender failed to direct his header on target. The early flurry faded but McCall would have been more than content with the way his team started.
As expected, Levante came back into the match and the David Navarro had an effort on the turn from a corner which the visitors failed to clear which was off target and Jose Barkero was next to try his luck with a fierce strike that flew over the crossbar.
With both teams willing to commit bodies forward, Keith Lasley found space on the edge of the Levante area but his effort was tame and at the other end Juanlu should have found the target as he tried to find the far post. If that was a squandered chance, then his next attempt was worse. The problem was all of the visitors' own doing as Steven Hammell put Page in trouble and the defender then made the wrong decision in attempting to head the ball back to Randolph. It was short and Juanlu found himself through on goal but again his shot lacked precision.
There was more hard work to come after the break. Theofanis Gekas' header was straight at Randolph but soon after the goalkeeper was forced to come racing from his goal to narrow the angle and block Nabil El Zhar's shot as the little winger sneaked in behind the Motherwell defence on the hour mark.
After a double substitution with Robert McHugh and Chris Humphrey replacing Henrik Ojamaa and Carswell respectively, El Zhar then missed the best chance of the match when he blazed over after skinning Steven Hammell inside the area.
There was, however, to be no let off. Motherwell surrendered territory and allowed the ball to make its way out to Juanlu on the left, his cross was met at the front post by Gekas and he steered the ball past Randolph.
It signalled another defeat from a European campaign in which Motherwell have failed to score but this was also a night when many of their kids with aplomb. "Someone gave me a stat that the average age at the end was 20; they did the club proud," said McCall, who revealed his hopes of signing Ryan Stevenson are receding. "I'm disappointed we didn't get anything out of the game but very pleased with the effort."
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