Socceroo Gianni Stensness has suffered an anti-climactic night as his Norwegian outsiders Viking FK slumped to a 3-1 defeat on their Champions League bow in Stuttgart.
Meanwhile, World Cup star Nestory Irankunda's hopes of making his debut in club football's biggest tournament on Wednesday will have to wait as he had to watch from the bench as his Portuguese side Sporting kicked off their challenge with a 3-1 win over Turkey's Galatasaray.
Twice-capped Stensness, the one-time Central Coast Mariners defensive midfielder who's become a cult figure for his Scandinavian side, was a central figure in Viking getting into group stages of the world's biggest club tournament for the first time, an achievement he'd happily dubbed as "crazy".
