Newry City hoping for encouraging performance away to title-chasing Larne
Sports Direct Premiership. Friday January 26 (8pm): Larne v Newry City
Newry City are considerable underdogs for this evening’s clash against Larne at Inver Park, but Barry Gray’s men will be hopeful of upsetting the odds against last season’s champions.
City’s record against top six sides has been poor since their return to the top flight in 2022, but one of Gray’s areas of improvement after taking the job at the start of the month was that his team wasn’t going to go down easily against anybody.
“We wanted today to be a game where we looked like a team, looked like a unit and we didn’t want to look like a team that was easy to roll over or easy to score goals against – and I think we got that in abundance,” said the new boss after their recent 2-1 defeat against Cliftonville.
“When I took over, one of the comments I got from the supporters was that they wanted the players to leave everything they had on the pitch, and in my opinion, today they got that.”
That Cliftonville game – which was Newry’s most recent contest as their scheduled match against Loughgall was postponed last week – will give the bottom-placed side confidence, as they battled for 90-plus minutes against one of the division’s best sides, before ultimately succumbing to a late Jonny Addis winner.
Newry can also take confidence from the fact that they also gave Larne a mighty scare when the sides met in October. City led against 10-men with 10 minutes to go, but two late Joe Thomson goals meant that they left empty-handed.
For this evening’s contest, Newry will be hoping to build on a good display 13 days ago, and may elect to throw new signing Jamie McDonagh into the starting line-up straight away – like they did with new signings Steven Ball, Brandon Doyle and Conor Mitchell against Clitonville.
Larne come into the game in good spirits after they claimed a fourth straight County Antrim Shield title with a 2-1 win over Glentoran on Tuesday night.
Newry will be hopeful that the Inver men take their eye off the ball, but Tiernan Lynch’s side are likely to cerebral to do so, and ultimately will be expected to continue their Premiership title push with a victory.