David Gray admitted he would need time to try to make sense of Hibernian’s epic 4-3 aggregate Conference League triumph over Partizan Belgrade.
The Hibees led 2-0 from the first leg in Serbia but their advantage was wiped out by half-time in the return at Easter Road after two costly mistakes from goalkeeper Jordan Smith.
Kieron Bowie’s 59th-minute wonder goal put the William Hill Premiership side back in front in the tie and they looked to be in full control when the visitors had Nikola Simic sent off shortly afterwards.
But Partizan struck deep into stoppage time to go 3-1 ahead on the night and force extra time, where Chris Cadden eventually landed the decisive blow of an exhilarating third qualifying round encounter to set up a play-off against Legia Warsaw.
“Trying to analyse that would be difficult, but ultimately it’s a brilliant result,” said manager Gray.
“A brilliant performance for the players to come through that tie over two legs. One thing I did say to the players is that I massively played down the magnitude of the result in the away leg.
“We played it down knowing it was half-time in the tie, but over the course of it, again loads of things I’ll need to analyse to make us better, but delighted for the players, delighted for everything that went with it.
“I think we fully deserve to be in the next round, so all in all, it’s a fantastic night’s work.”
Gray felt his side showed their mettle to recover from going 2-0 down in the first half.
“I actually thought we played really well in the first half, the shape was good and we created big chances within the game,” he added.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t take our chances and then it’s a couple of mistakes from Smudge, who didn’t cover himself in glory, but the second one, there were elements of that, we can defend better.
“So we find ourselves 2-0 down, and the message at half-time was that this is a massive test of your character but I think we certainly came through that.”
Partizan coach Srdjan Blagojevic – whose side had a man sent off in both legs – said of Bowie’s strike: “It was a once-in-a-lifetime goal and it changed the momentum. The atmosphere was amazing.
“It was a big experience for my young team. It was a great game and it would not have been undeserved if Partizan was the team which qualified.
“I was proud of them for going so close to qualifying even though we played with 10 men for 120 minutes of the tie.”
