Frank Temile looks to move past Aleksander Rajcevic, of Maribor. Photo: Darrin Zammit Lupi

Birkirkara coach Paul Zammit is challenging his players to rise to the occasion and help the club achieve an historic passage to the third qualifying round of the Champions League when they face Maribor in Slovenia, tonight (kick-off 8pm).

A goalless draw in last week’s second qualifying round, first leg, at the National Stadium has given the Slovenian champions a slight edge.

But Birkirkara’s spirited per-formance, which saw them missing a series of goalscoring oppor-tunities, has inevitably increased Zammit’s belief that his team could surprise their more-quoted oppo-nents.

A draw of more than two goals or a win would see the Stripes through to a third-qualifying round clash against Cypriot champions Apoel.

“I’m expecting a completely different Maribor team to the one we faced last week,” Zammit told Times of Malta yesterday.

“They were disappointed not to have beaten us in Malta so they’re treating the return leg as their biggest match in this early phase of the season. Maribor want to play in the group stages of the Champions League so that makes our job even more difficult as they will take the field determined to get the result they need to progress to the next round.”

Zammit, however, reckons his players are not feeling over-whelmed by the occasion.

“We are here with sights firmly set to play to our highest levels,” he said.

“No Maltese team has ever reached the third qualifying round of this competition. I’m sure that is a big-enough in-centive to inspire my players to shrug off the jitters and give their all despite playing away.”

Midfielder Ryan Scicluna is still not fully fit and he misses the match while defender Joseph Zerafa is struggling with a muscle strain.

Maribor warmed up for this match with an impressive 3-0 win at Rudar Velenje to maintain their perfect record in the national league after the opening two match-days.

“Maribor are certainly on form at the moment, at least that’s what their results show,” Zammit said.

“They are only treating last week’s match at Ta’ Qali as a minor blip. They’ve won two league matches and also beat Olimpija Ljubljana 3-0 in the Slovenia Super Cup.

“We’re sure they will be very aggressive right from the start, they won’t defend their away goal to make it to the next round.

“But we can hit back and we have the right tools to get to grips with the situation.

“Frank Temile, Demba Toure and Shola Haruna can all be dangerous on the counter-break. We must be sharp in attack and make the most of the chances that come our way.”

Latvia referee Andris Treimanis will be in charge of tonight’s match at the Ljudski Stadium.