Derek McInnes: Conference League riches unimaginable for a club like Kilmarnock

Derek McInnes is well aware of the magnitude of Kilmarnock’s Conference League clash against Copenhagen.

The Rugby Park outfit are in Denmark for the first leg of the play-off on Thursday night and relative riches await Killie if they get through.

However, the hosts are an established European outfit – beating Manchester United in last season’s Champions League group stage – though they needed penalties to get past Banik Ostrava in the last round.

Manager McInnes, who guided Killie to fourth place last season after bringing the Ayrshire club out of the Championship in 2022, told BBC Scotland that it was “by some stretch” his biggest couple of matches since taking over Killie.

He added: “Two-and-a-half-years ago, my first game was at Palmerston (Queen of the South) away in the Championship.

“So the club has come a long way. Financially, the rewards for the club is off the scale really, for a club like ourselves to try and generate best part of £4m from a one-off tie. It’s unimaginable, really.

“We can’t earn that in Scotland in terms of prize money.

“So we’re under no illusions how difficult the task is going to be. They are a team who were performing in the Champions League last year.

“I remember watching those games and there was added interest with big (Scott) McKenna playing for Copenhagen, and I was really impressed by the speed and athleticism and the technical ability of the Copenhagen team.

“A lot of those players are still here, and while they’re struggling for their best form, this is still a huge, huge task for us to try and overcome this type of opponent.

“But we’re in the same competition, we’ve found ourselves against them, and it’s important that we try and be brave enough and courageous enough to try and take that on.”