Blues are eyeing fifth title in row, says Mcguinness
LINFIELD Ladies captain Kirsty Mcguinness has declared that they feel like Christmas has come early after the announcement that the Danske Bank Women’s Premiership will kick-off next month.
And with the delayed season just a month away, her sights are set on leading the Windsor Park girls to a fifth successive title.
The Northern Ireland Football League confirmed that the campaign will start on Wednesday, August 26, meaning it will be the first national league here to start after Covid-19 led to the suspension of all football in March.
“For the last month or so we’ve been waiting patiently to see what the outcome of the meetings was,” said Mcguinness.
“We’ve been back training for a few weeks. At the beginning it was different, but we’re getting back to normal now and being allowed to train properly. With the league starting, everyone is really excited and can’t wait to go. You’d think it was Christmas.
“We’re sitting on four in a row and we want to keep going and keep winning the league.”
The Women’s Premiership had been due to start in April, with Cliftonville Ladies, Crusaders Strikers, Derry City Women, Glentoran Women, Linfield and Sion Swifts Ladies facing each other four times, but they will now play a shortened season with 10 league matches. Fixtures will be announced on Friday.
MICK Mcdermott has declared that he has no regrets about being the only manager of the four clubs in the Irish Cup semi-finals to insist on extra-time.
With Monday’s matches between Coleraine and Ballymena United and Cliftonville versus Glentoran the first competitive fixtures for the players since March, the Irish FA were willing to shake up their rules and go straight to penalties after 90 minutes if all the clubs agreed but while David Jeffrey (Ballymena), Oran Kearney (Coleraine) and Paddy Mclaughlin (Cliftonville) were content to go with Plan B, Glens boss Mcdermott stated he wanted extra-time to take place if the ties were level at the end of normal time.
That’s exactly what happened with both games finishing 1-1 before Ballymena won 3-1 on penalties and the Glens were 7-6 victors in their shoot-out.
The Belfast battle turned out to be a classic played at a high tempo, though Mcdermott expects his team to have fully recovered for Friday’s Windsor Park final.
“I was the only coach who voted for extra-time so I’ll take the blame for that but I don’t regret it,” said Mcdermott. “We’ve been asked to change rules so many times in recent months and it wasn’t our choice to play Monday/friday.
“We could have played Saturday/saturday or Monday/saturday. The Uefa spot doesn’t need to be nominated until August 3 so it wasn’t my decision to make it Monday/friday, so why should it be my decision to fix a problem?
“I think football is about extra-time and penalties. Of course, the health and wellbeing of players has to be important but they are footballers and the decision was justified by the excitement of the extra-time and penalties in both games.
“I’m not worried about fitness for the final after extra-time, there is a four-day turnaround. A three-day turnaround I’d be worried when you look at the statistics and data but I’m not worried about the four-day turnaround.
“During the season we play Saturday/tuesday but even though we’ve been off for so long, if you’ve got your preparation right you shouldn’t be worried. It will be hard and niggles are likely but that’s something we’ll deal with.”
The Glens handled everything thrown at them by Cliftonville to reach the final against Ballymena with veteran goalkeeper Elliott Morris the hero, saving penalties from the excellent Conor Mcmenamin and Conor Mcdermott to earn a famous triumph. It was a shrewd choice from Mcdermott to select 39-year-old Morris ahead of Marijan Antolovic.
“Elliott playing was a big call.
It always is when you leave people out but we make decisions based on not just ability, but form,” said Mcdermott.
“We’re observing people every day in training and we had to make a call. I know people will say Elliott justified the call but that’s not to say Marijan wouldn’t have made the same saves, though Elliott has come up trumps in the end.
“He’s coming into his 19th season at Glentoran this coming season and he’s going to be a big part of it.”
Those comments from Mcdermott gave an indication of the importance of Morris to the east Belfast club given that promising Institute goalkeeper Rory Brown is on his way to the Oval along with ex-northern Ireland defender Luke Mccullough, with Derry City midfielder Jamie McDonagh another likely arrival.
There were big performances all over the pitch from the Glens, led expertly by skipper Marcus Kane. Patrick Mcclean and Joe Crowe were strong and Navid Nasseri and goalscorer Robbie Mcdaid a constant threat. McDermott made a point of praising substitute Ciaran O’connor, who he felt helped transform the game.
The Glens manager added: “We are halfway there. It’s nice to get through and it’s nice to be