Saturday 22nd September 2018
Kick Off 3pm
On Saturday we welcome newly promoted Institute to the Oval for the first time since New Year’s Day 2015. As a club we would like to welcome Institute back to Premiership football. Institute is a club that has faced terrible off the pitch ordeals so it is a testament to the club’s officials, manager, players and supporters that they achieved promotion last season despite the tragic loss of their stadium in winter storms. They certainly deserve their place in this division.
Institute have got off to a promising start to the season with eight points from their first seven matches, though suffered a heavy defeat to Glenavon at the Brandywell last weekend.
Ronnie McFall: “Tuesday against Queen’s was a bit flat after our very strong performance against Newry and we had a scary moment when they went a goal up just before half time. Elliott Morris said that the Queen’s goal is something we probably wouldn’t have bounced back from last season. But the team has an awful lot more confidence in itself now so I didn’t doubt they’d keep their heads and go on and win the match. There’s a greater hunger, desire and spirit about them now and it was great to see four goals in a win shared between four different players. Curtis took his two goals well – he always threatens to give you that in all levels of match – with John McGuigan assisting for both. It’s often hard for a team to lift themselves for a game like that and if you’re not careful it can be over before you’ve got going and you’re out. We didn’t let that happen and the important thing is that we got the win.
Saturday against Institute is another important one for us because while we want to stay in and hopefully win all the cups we enter, ultimately, we’ll be judged by our consistency in the league. Institute had a bad result last week but overall they’ve made a decent start to their return to the top league so we’ll not be complacent or take anything about this match for granted.
We’re a bit short upfront. Robbie McDaid will need another week or so for his hamstring to fully recover while Sam Byrne will miss out with a calf injury. To be honest, Sam maybe shouldn’t have started on Tuesday night but he wanted game time and we wanted to give him every opportunity to build up his match fitness. It’s not a serious one but he won’t make it this weekend. We’ll reshuffle a bit with John McGuigan likely to move into the more central role he started the season with. John did very well when he moved there on Tuesday and his two assists obviously helped turn the game our way. So I’ve no difficulty asking John to play there.
Apart from that we’ve no injury worries. Joe Crowe missed Tuesday with a bug. Joe is a good player who I think will give the club a lot so he’s back into contention for Saturday.
Finally, best of luck to the Women’s senior team in their Irish Cup Final. It’s always good to see a Glentoran team in a major final so hopefully their success can help inspire the men’s team to achieve something similar by the end of this season”.
On ‘state’s last visit here we had a good 4-1 win with goals from David Scullion (2), Danny McKee and Jordan Stewart. We’ll be hoping for at least the win this weekend.
The Board of Directors at Glentoran Football Club would again request that all supporters travelling to the Oval by private car consider the local residents when deciding where and how to park. Local parking is freely available at the Arches Health Centre.
