Nilsson positive despite Larsson loss

Though denied the inspirational presence of veteran striker Henrik Larsson for the second leg of their UEFA Europa League third qualifying round tie with FK Sarajevo, Helsingborgs IK coach Bo Nilsson still feels his side have enough firepower to progress to the competition's play-off stage.

'Very positive'
Larsson suffered a broken kneecap just 23 minutes into last Thursday's first-leg encounter but Helsingborg shrugged the setback aside to record a 2-1 victory and Nilsson is hopeful they can pick up where they left off when the tie resumes in Sarajevo. "I think we did really well to come back after Henrik's injury and then conceding the equaliser," the coach said. "The fact that we went on to score another goal and created chances for a third was also very positive.

Lantz may return
"We normally score a lot of goals, both in the league and in Europe, so we'll try to keep that going," added Nilsson, whose charges secured their single-goal advantage through midfielder Ólafur Ingi Skúlason's headed winner after Damir Hadžić had cancelled out Christoffer Andersson's penalty opener. As for the loss of Larsson, Nilsson told uefa.com: "Unfortunately Henrik won't be fit for Thursday. His patella is ruptured and it will be four to six weeks before he's back. But we've no other injury worries at the moment and we're hoping to have Marcus Lantz back in midfield after missing the first game. He's a very good player for us."

'Space to counterattack'
Looking ahead to the contest at the Koševo Stadium, the Swedish trainer continued: "I'm expecting Sarajevo to attack more than they did in Helsingborg. They need to win so of course they'll have to try and create chances. Hopefully that'll open up space for us to counterattack because I think we'll need to score a goal or two." Given the fiercely partisan atmosphere that is sure to reign in the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina, is he tempted to adopt a more defensive approach? "We're used to playing the same way wherever we are because in Sweden the difference between home and away games is not as big as in many other countries," replied Nilsson, whose team won 2-1 at Hammarby on Monday to go a point clear at the top of the Swedish Allsvenskan.

Europa ambition
And having so far been able to successfully juggle his side's bids for domestic and European success, how far does Nilsson feel Helsingborg can go in this season's UEFA Europa League? "Well, we talked before the season about reaching the group stage of the Europa League," he said. "Our goal hasn't changed, we're still hoping to do just that."