Tuffey admires ambitious Crues but believes Lurgan Blues are improving
GLENAVON goalkeeper Jonny Tuffey will today doff his cap to acknowledge the Irish League champions, but the pleasantries will end there!
Since taking the bold move to full-time football, Stephen Baxter’s Crusaders haven’t exactly set the place alight. The loss of the influential Gavin Whyte to Oxford United has been a contributory factor to their early season anaemia, while a posse of the big hitters formed an orderly queue for the treatment room.
It means when the squad boards to coach for Mourneview Park today, the Crues find themselves struggling in sixth place in the table.
Most of their problems have developed at their fortress on the Shore Road, having lost to Linfield and Coleraine. It also took a second half goal from new boy Rory Patterson to rescue a point against Ballymena United.
In contrast, Gary Hamilton’s Lurgan Blues are still dining at the top table, just three points behind a resurgent Linfield.
Tuffey believes the Crues should be applauded for trying to move the club forward by taking the decision to move fulltime and expects them to come out with all guns blazing today.
“We are playing the defending champions and are under no illusions how difficult it will be,” said the former Northern Ireland shot stopper.
“It’s been phenomenal what they have achieved over the past lot of years. It’s an ambitious move to put the full-time structure in place. If more teams can generate the income and get to that level it would be fantastic.
“It would be great for the standard of the league which I reckon is continually improving. From the staff right through to the players, they have tremendous quality.
“People are saying they haven’t benefited, but it’s like anything in life. If you change something, it takes time to adapt.”
“Since we lost to Linfield, we have been putting points on the board ever since,” added Tuffey. “There was a lot of new players introduced and they have gelled. I still believe we have yet to produce our best form.
“As a goalkeeper you want to keep as many clean sheets as possible. But we play at a very, high tempo, we are attack minded. Sometimes that will present chances to the opposition. It’s something we are working on.
“We always fancy our chances of scoring goals. We work tremendously hard with the staff on the training ground and we are striving to be better in all areas.”