Three days after their interminable, groundbreaking European campaign came to an end in agonising fashion in front of Tallaght's South Stand, it's back to comparatively humdrum matters for Shamrock Rovers as they host Cork City in the league.
When all is said and done, Rovers played a whopping 18 games in European competition in 2024-25, an unprecedented number in an Irish context, albeit one which was partly facilitated by the more generous format in the Conference League this year.
Still, Rovers did themselves proud throughout the campaign, dispatching the Slovenian and Bosnian champions en route, securing a highly impressive draw away to Rapid Vienna and then taking Molde to the brink in the knockout phase.
Two days out from the Cork game, Bradley was understandably still inclined to reflect on a tumultuous night in Tallaght on Thursday.
"It is a hard one to take," the Hoops boss told the club website.
"We've had our staff review on the Molde game, we go through all our metrics on it so we’re not emotional thinking about it, and how we performed, and if we should’ve gone through.
"All the metrics tell us what we felt that we were the better team over both legs and we deserved to go through. But unfortunately, in life and in football, you don’t always get what you deserve."
Stephen Bradley's side have begun a curious tradition starting slowly in the league in recent years, going six games without a win at the start of the 2023 and then four without a victory at the start of last year.
They recovered to win the title - their fourth in a row - with a reasonable degree of comfort in '23. They surrendered their crown in '24 although culpability for that mainly lay with an early summer slump, prompted by a chronic injury crisis.
Their title hopes were essentially written off at the time, they somehow managed to take it to the final day of the season, with only Harry Wood's late winner in the Brandywell denying them an unprecedented fifth successive title.
"How we were in a title race last year, I'll never know," Bradley observed last week ahead of the first leg in Molde.
Sure enough, for the third year running, they've failed to register a win on the opening day, this time losing to their bitterest rivals on a novel and invigorating occasion in the Aviva Stadium. There was at least mitigation in the shape of their exploits in Europe, the opener against Bohs sandwiched between their two huge ties against Molde.
Their first home league of the season sees the return of former Player of the Year Rory Gaffney, the 35-year old target man having missed much of the last campaign with injury. Trevor Clarke received his all-clear on Thursday, though it remains to be seen whether he'll be involved.
It could be a week too soon for Jack Byrne, with Bradley indicating the midfielder will be available for next weekend's game away to Shelbourne. Darragh Nugent and Danny Mandriou remain a couple of weeks away from fitness, the former ruled out with a nose injury.
As for the fatigue factor after Thursday, Bradley admitted: "I'm sure Cork will be delighted we went to extra-time."
There was little doubt about Cork's return to the top flight from early doors last season. They mathematically secured promotion with a full six games to spare, with 2017 hero Seanie Maguire returning to his old stomping ground mid-season.
They drew their opener 2-2 with Galway United in Turner's Cross, Dutch striker Malik Dijksteel and LOI veteran Greg Bolger both putting Cork at various points but with Galway's American duo - Patrick Hickey and Vincent Borden - levelling things up for Galway.
Tim Clancy paid a slightly barbed compliment to the westerners last week, crediting them for being "streetwise" and suggesting that his own team needed to learn what he called "the arts".
Cork's last visit to Tallaght in August 2023 saw them fall to a 2-1 defeat, Graham Burke and Liam Burt scoring for the victors. This time, however, Cork might feel they're getting the Hoops at the right time.
Shamrock Rovers v Cork City, Sunday 6pm
