RIGA — Tonight in Riga, FK Ventspils have a chance of becoming the first Latvian team to qualify for the UEFA Champions League, when they host Swiss team FK Zurich in the first leg of the UEFA Champions League play-off round.

By just making the final stage of qualifying to play in Europe’s most prestigious club football competition is a huge feat for the Latvian club, who in previous years have stumbled at previous qualifying stages.

Ventspils has already knocked out Belarusian club champions BATE, in what many regarded as an upset, as BATE last year qualified to play in the Champions League.

The win came on the back of a strong home performance, where Ventspils proved to be a particularly difficult opponent.

Swiss champions FK Zurich have previous experience at Champions League level, albeit 28 years ago, before a number of the current team were even born. It will be the first time the team plays a club from Latvia.

Reputable football website goal.com believe that Ventspils’ recent home form will make them too much of force for the Swiss, but the question is whether the Latvian side can gain enough of an advantage on their home leg to go through on aggregate following their trip to Zurich on Aug. 25.

Either way, tonight’s football match will be the biggest to be played in Latvia since Latvia hosted Turkey in the final round of qualifying for Euro 2004, a game which saw Latvia win 1-0, before advancing through based on the away goal rule.

Latvian football fans as a whole, and not just those who support Ventspils, will be hoping for a similar outcome tonight.

Balticreports.com prediction: Recent home form based on an almost impenetrable defence puts the safe money on Ventspils to win tonight, and knowing that the task to win away on Aug 25. will be a much more difficult task, Ventspils will play an attacking game in an attempt to really make use of the home advantage. Ventspils to win 2-0.