‘SURREAL,’ SAYS RED IMPS MATCHWINNER

LEE CASCIARO, the Gibraltarian policeman who scored the winner in Lincoln Red Imps’ humbling of Celtic, described the victory as “surreal”.

The 34-year-old Gibraltar international striker admitted scoring the only goal of the game for a semi-professional side that first played in the Champions League only two years ago will be something he remembers for the rest of his life.

He said: “It’s what people dream about since they are a young kid playing in Gibraltar – beating a big club like Celtic.

“Scoring the winning goal is something I will remember for the rest of my life. I scored for Gibraltar against Scotland, but we lost 6-1. This time we won and it’s a major achievement for a small club like Lincoln and the whole of Gibraltar.

“This is like a hobby for us. We have a couple of professionals from Spain and a few locals. We train daily around two hours, but combine it with the other things we do at the moment.

“It is surreal and we’ve done it.

“We knew we would cause them problems. We knew the pitch and the weather wouldn’t benefit them; that they weren’t used to these conditions and were going to struggle.

“If we pressured them they’d leave spaces defensively. We had to exploit that.

“We know the second leg will be completely different; at Celtic Park against 60,000 people cheering them on, and the pitch will benefit them.

“But we will work on it before we leave and if we can sore a goal there they will have to score three, so we’ll see what we can do.”