St Johnstone manager Tommy Wright admits it has been difficult to gather intelligence on Europa League opponents Alashkert.
The 3,000 miles between Perth and the Armenian captital of Yerevan, where Thursday’s first qualifying round tie first leg will be played, has ensured that Wright’s dossier on the opposition will be thinner than he would have liked.
Doing his homework has helped Wright outwit all of his Euro rivals in their own backyard so far.
Two years ago he masterminded a 1-0 win in Norway against Rosenborg then followed that up with another 1-0 victory, this time over FC Minsk in Belarus.
Last year saw Wright’s men hold a classy Luzern side to a 1-1 draw in Switzerland then it was the same scoreline in Slovakia against Spartak Trnava.
However, the logistics of playing a team so far away has meant the McDiarmid manager has just had to make do with what little he has this time around.
To make quantifying their ability and threat even more difficult, Alashkert have had a huge turnaround in personnel.
Wright said: “We’ve got a lot of footage on them from last season but they have brought in seven new players, nearly all of them from rival club Mika.
“So we will look at footage of that team as well,” added the Northern Irishman, who has had DVDs compiled for each Saints player to watch and study.
“The fact they have half-a-dozen in from Mika, a team that finished below them in the league, suggests the players will be of similar ability and stature in the game.
“The transition to a new club for them should be straightforward but it will depend on how many their manager decides to play on Thursday.
“The problem is that I can’t get anything in terms of footage of pre-season matches.
“I would imagine, though, that they are in the same boat as us when it comes to getting details of our recent games.
“We do have information on individual players and systems that they played last year so that can be used as a guide.
“However, normally you would watch them in friendlies or league games.
“It wasn’t easy getting a lot of info on Luzern initially but at least we were able to watch them in two friendlies.
“All in all, this time we have prepared as well as we can in the circumstances.
“The important thing is that we have to be ready to put in a performance.
“It’s fair to say this will be the least we have known about our opposition because we were even able to watch Minsk before playing them.
“But we aren’t concerned because we know how we will set up and we have had a good pre-season.”
As well as having a paucity of info on the opposition, Saints will also have the temperature to contend with.
A high of 37C is being forecast for Thursday, although the hope is that by the 7pm kick-off (local time) things will have cooled off a bit.
Wright added: “The heat could be a factor so we are doing everything possible on the medical side in term of fluids and hydration tablets.
“The doctor will take care of that.
“Every player will react differently to the heat and that may influence the team selection and timings of substitutions.
“But it was very warm in Luzern last season and we had to work extremely hard.
“It might be mid-30s for this game but our fitness levels are good.”