UCD under-19s suffer penalty shoot-out heartache against Molde in UEFA Youth League

UCD under-19s suffered penalty shootout heartache as they they were knocked out of the UEFA Youth League by a strong Molde FK side in Norway on Tuesday night.

The Students had goalkeeper Conor Kearns to thank for forcing sudden death after he saved the Norwegian side's final spot-kick but it was to prove a bridge too far for the league champions.

The travelling party took a 2-1 first leg advantage into the match in Molde and manager Maciej Tarnogrodski opted to stick with the same eleven that triumphed in Belfield.

They fell behind just after the half-hour, however, Sivert Gussias finishing well to put the home 1-0 up on the night and into the lead on away goals.

Things got worse three minutes into the second half when captain Leo Oestigaard, who had scored a header in the first leg, repeated the trick from a corner to put Molde 2-0 up and 3-2 on aggregate.

The Students weren't bowed, however, and they struck back within three minutes as Jack Ryan finished from Neil Farrugia's set-up.

That's how it remained until the end of 90 minutes and, with extra time not applied at this stage, the match went immediately to penalties.

After the first five penalties were converted, Ryan was the first to err from the spot as he saw his effort saved by Jonatan Byttingsvik.

Kearns saved from Tobias Svendsen and Farrugia converted to force sudden death, but when Hermann Svendsen scored it was Luke Boore who had the misfortune of seeing his kick saved.

The Students' attention will now return to domestic matters and the retention of their under-19 National League title as they'll soon find out their semi-final opponents.