Saturday 19th December 2020, Kick Off 3.00pm
Tomorrow we prematurely play our last fixture of the ever unpredictable 2020 when the team travel to the Showgrounds to play Ballymena United in the Danske Bank Premiership.
After the disappointment of Tuesday's 0-0 against Warrenpoint, we will be seeking a first away league win of the season at what has been one of our favourite away venue of recent years. In the fourteen years since January 2007, the Glens have experienced only 2 defeats in this fixture. Indeed, our last 15 league visits to the Braidmen have seen an incredible 11 wins and 2 draws.
Last season our only visit saw a dramatic late 2-1victory on 24th August 19. Having trailed going into the final 10 minutes of the match to an Andy McGrory free kick early in the second half, it took until the 84th minute for Robbie McDaid to race clear, after a headed flick on by sub Johnny Frazer, and fire home the equalizer.
Buoyed by that goal (and a rousing visiting support) the Glens pushed relentlessly for a winner until, in the 93rd minute, Elvio Van Overbeek found space on the right and crossed low to McDaid, who duly got the break of the ball to swivel and fire home the winner with virtually the last kick of the game.
After a slow start, David Jeffrey's side have recorded 4 wins and a draw from their last 5 matches to move up to 4th place - this run has included a 5-1 thumping of Dungannon at Stangmore Park last Saturday and a 4-0 win prior to that against Cliftonville at Solitude. Summer signings Shea McCartan and Paul McElroy have been key in their recent run, with ex Accrington and Bradford forward McCartan and the ex Dungannon and Crusaders winger McElroy scoring 4 goals apiece.
Mick McDermott: “Tuesday night against Warrenpoint wasn’t at all what we expected after our excellent performance against Carrick. In the first half I felt we let Warrenpoint get first to the ball far too often, so we were never able to settle. In the second half we created plenty of chances but that’s no use if we don’t score them. Jamie McDonagh got a couple of excellent crosses in when he came on but unfortunately no one managed to get on the end of them well enough. I said in advance of the match that they would be very well organised. That proved to be the case, but it was still very frustrating that we couldn’t break them down well enough.
Tomorrow at Ballymena will be another tough one, as some of their recent results would suggest. But every match in this league is a tough one, as we’ve seen from some of the results secured by teams that were in the bottom half last season. But we’ll go there with a full squad as hopefully Ciaran O’Connor will have fully recovered, so we’ll have plenty of options to take there. I’m looking forward to it and so is the squad.
As this is the last match preview before Christmas, I’d like to take this opportunity to wish everyone in the Glentoran Family a very merry and safe Christmas, and a new year when everyone will eventually be able to return to supporting our team in the stadium on matchday”.
Tomorrow’s match will be streamed live through Ballymena United’s in-house service www.ballymenaunitedfc.tv
Instructions for accessing the game are simple:
1. go to www.ballymenaunitedfc.tv and click 'Get Access'
2. create an account
3. pay with PayPal or credit/debit card
The stream costs £7.50 which includes access to a re-run. Commentary will be by Jackie Fullerton with former Ballymena United and St Johnstone manager Tommy Wright as the summariser.
Help is also available at support@ballymenaunitedfc.tv should you have any problems.
