Ian Foster joined up with his side after a short spell in England where he was completing a pro-license course in order to gain the qualification necessary to allow him to lead Dundalk out in UEFA sanctioned tournaments. Dundalk will face Grevenmacher in the 8,000 seater Stade Josy Bathel stadium - located in the capital, it is where the Luxembourg national team play their home games - in what will be the Lilywhites' first foray into European competition since 2002.
And it was recently confirmed that Oriel Park has been cleared by UEFA to host European matches, meaning the stadium will host its first competitive European match since 1991 in the second-leg on Thursday, July 8th. Bulgarian side Levski Sofia await the victors of the two-legged tie.
And with Grevenmacher's appalling away record in Europe - they have never won a two-legged tie and have won only three matches from 18, conceding 49 goals in the process - Dundalk will fancy their chances of booking a place alongside fellow League of Ireland sides Sporting Fingal and Shamrock Rovers in the second qualifying round.
But Foster's side will need to recapture the early season form that saw them top the Premier Division if they are to overcome the five time Luxembourg Cup winners. Dundalk go into the tie on the back of four defeats in five games and their worst defeat of the season - a 3-0 reverse to Bohemians.
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CS Grevenmacher are Dundalk's opponents in the first qualifying round of the Europa League - here is the lowdown on the Luxembourg minnows.
Founded in 1909 the club was originally known as 'Stade Mosellan' and adopted its current name in 1919. During the Nazi occupation of Luxembourg the club changed its name to FK Grevenmacher as part of Naxi Germanisation, but reverted to its current name upon liberation in 1944. The club colours are blue and white and they play their domestic home games in the Op Flohr Stadion.
The club only established itself as domestic trophy contenders during the 90s and - having lost four Luxembourg Cup finals previously - finally won the competition, the club's first silverware, in 1994. Grevenmacher have since won the competition a further four times.
The club won the National Division Championship for the first and only time to date in the 2002/03 season, thus granting Grevenmacher entry to the Champions League for the first time (where they were beaten by the Bosnia & Herzegovina side FK Leotar 2-0 in the second leg having drawn the first leg 0-0 at home).
The Luxembourg side first qualified for European competition in 1993/94 and have qualified for UEFA competitions ten times in total, including their qualification for this season's Europa League. They have never won a two-legged tie in Europe, but have won three games - all at home - against HJK Helsinki of Finland (2-0), KR Reykjavik of Iceland (3-2) and Anorthosis Fangusta of Cyprus (2-0).
Overall, their European record reads: played 18, won 3, drawn 2 and lost 13, with 14 goals scored and 49 against.
Current manager Claude Osweiler has been in charge since 2007, re-establishing Grevenmacher as title challengers after they went stale following their title win in 2002/03. Osweiler's biggest goal threat is arguably former Luxembourg international Daniel Huss. The 30-year-old striker was at Grevenmacher in his youth but left to join Standard Liege and then Kaiserlautern. Having failed to make an appearance for either club, the 5ft 11ins goal-poacher returned to Grevenmacher where he has scored 151 goals in 251 league games. His international record pales in comparison: he has scored two goals in 46 appearances.
Another potential danger man is Lautaro Tejerina. The Argentine plays either as a right-sided midfielder or as a raiding full-back and enjoys showing off his skills when he gets the chance. He is fleet-footed and can make opposition players look quite silly at times - as can be seen from the YouTube video he has uploaded of himself.
Dundalk went on to win a thrilling tie 5-4 on aggregate, drawing the first-leg 3-3 away (having been 2-0 up with 30 minutes left to play) and winning the second-leg 2-1 at Oriel Park (reports by Extratime.ie).
It seems I made one serious error in this article and perhaps erred in my mentioning of the two players. Originally, I say that the Grevenmacher manager was Claude Osweiler but in fact it was Marc Thomé, who it seems had been in charge of the club once before between 1994 and '97 as a player-coach (if Wikipedia is to be believed).
Thomé returned to the club for the last two games of the 2009/10 season, and victory in one of those games secured the club third place by a solitary point - though they still finished 14 points off top spot. Thomé is even quoted by Extratime.ie on his thoughts ahead of the second leg of this tie.
Regarding the players I mentioned, Daniel Huss and Lautaro Tejerina, neither played any part in the tie. Though I was unable to figure out why Huss didn't play (the likelihood is he was injured or suspended), I did ascertain that not only was he playing for Grevenmacher at the time they faced Dundalk, but that he is still playing for, and captaining, the club now - with nine goals in 12 games, including a hat-trick against Racing Football Club Union Lëtzebuerg, he is the club's top scorer this season. Tejerina had seemingly departed the club.
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