Both Crusaders and Linfield face an uphill battle to progress from the UEFA Conference League following defeat in their respective first qualifying round first leg ties.

Caernarfon Town 2-0 Crusaders
The Crues made the short journey to Wales to take on Caernarfon Town, but ended up on the wrong side of a 2-0 scoreline in Bangor.

Caernarfon, on their European debut, got off to a dream start when Morgan Owen opened the scoring after just four minutes with a stunning curling effort beyond the reach of Jonny Tuffey from just outside the box.

Then, eight minutes from the break, they doubled their advantage when Zach Clarke combined well with Darren Thomas to get past the defence and slot past the advancing Tuffey.

Crusaders did have second half opportunities to reduce the deficit, coming closest when Philip Lowry saw a header cleared off the line by Gruff John Williams before, a short time after that, a James Teelan header was also stopped - this time by Danny Gosset - as it appeared goalbound.

The sides meet again in the return at Seaview next Wednesday evening (17th July), kick-off 7:45pm.

Caernarfon Town: McMullan, Owen, Sears, Mooney, Jones, Mendes, Gosset, Hill, Thomas, Lloyd, Clarke subs Thomas, Tibbetts, Downey, Faux, Pritchard, G. Williams, M. Williams.

Crusaders: Tuffey, Larmour, Weir, Blaney, Barr, Lowry, Clarke, Kennedy, Offord, Stewart, O'Rourke subs Kerr, Bond, Boyd, Donnelly, Harrison, James, Lecky, Maguire, Nixon, Teelan, Vance

Stjarnan 2-0 Linfield
Linfield fell to a two-goal defeat away to Icelandic side Stjarnan courtesy of a double from Emil Atlason.

The 30-year-old striker opened the scoring midway through the first half with a superbly executed curling free-kick around the wall and past keeper Chris Johns.

Linfield might have levelled just before the half-hour mark when Kyle McClean was upended in the box by Kjartan Kjartansson but, from the subsequent spot-kick, Chris Shields could only fire the ball off the underside of the bar before it was cleared.

The home side doubled their advantage on the hour, with Atlason bagging his second of the evening after his initial effort from another free-kick came back off the wall before his follow up ricocheted off a defender to wrong foot Johns.

The Blues came close again after that, with Kirk Millar being unfortunate to see his effort nodded off the line by Orvar Eggertsson while, late in the game, Joel Cooper fired through a crowded goalmouth only to see the ball go narrowly wide.

David Healy's side will attempt to overhaul the deficit at Windsor Park in the return leg next Thursday evening, kick-off 7:45pm.

Stjarnan: Rosenorn, Omarsson, Aegisson, Kristjansson, Ingimarsson, Orvarsson, Thorkelsson, Ingason, Kjartansson, Eggertsson, Atlason subs Olafsson, Gunnarsson, Laxdal, Halldorsson, Birgisson, Valdimarsson, Adolphsson,Matthiasson, Gudlaugsson, Brink, Gudjonsson, Gudmonsson

Linfield: Johns, McGee, Whiteside, Roscoe, McKay, Shields, McClean, Ballantyne, Millar, Cooper, McKee subs Walsh, McBrien, Archer, Mulgrew, Fitzpatrick, McCullough, Annett, Chapman, Orr