Pico Lopes misses Shamrock Rovers' Champions League opener after Cape Verde's World Cup run

Shamrock Rovers began their UEFA Champions League qualifying campaign without key defender Roberto ‘Pico’ Lopes, losing 2-0 to Floriana in the first leg in Malta on Tuesday. The 34-year-old had returned to Dublin just the day before, three days after Cape Verde pushed defending World Cup champions Argentina and Lionel Messi to the limit in a 3-2 round-of-32 defeat at Miami Gardens.

“I’ll miss the game in Malta, unfortunately,” Lopes told reporters at Dublin airport, “but I’m looking forward to getting back into training and getting back to doing what I love.” Lopes has been a fixture at Shamrock Rovers since 2016, and the club will hope to have him available when they host Floriana in the second leg next Tuesday.

Elsewhere in the first qualifying round, Lincoln Red Imps of Gibraltar opened the Champions League’s scoring for the season with a 16th-minute penalty from 41-year-old left back Nano — older than Cristiano Ronaldo — in a 3-1 win over Andorra’s Inter Club d’Escaldes. The competition’s early rounds took in a broad sweep of European football’s smaller nations, including San Marino, the Faroe Islands, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Bosnian champions Borac Banja Luka drew 1-1 at home against Levski Sofia, though they too were without a key player returning from the World Cup: 18-year-old goalkeeper Mladen Jurkas.

Four more first-round ties are scheduled for Wednesday, with action in Estonia, Moldova, and Kazakhstan, where Kairat Almaty — who reached the Champions League group stage in the previous edition and faced Real Madrid, Arsenal, and Inter Milan — begin their campaign. Belarus champions Vitebsk are playing their nominal home fixture in neutral Hungary, with no supporters permitted in the stadium. UEFA has barred Belarusian clubs from hosting games on home soil since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, while Russian clubs remain suspended from all European competition.

The first qualifying round of the UEFA Conference League also got under way on Tuesday, with games in Albania and Luxembourg. The Europa League follows on Thursday, featuring clubs of the calibre of Qarabag, Dynamo Kyiv, and Ferencvaros.