Currie calls on Carrick to maintain top standard
CARRICK Rangers play their 106th home Premiership game today but only twice before have they recorded back-to-back victories. When Warrenpoint Town arrive this afternoon, they have the chance to make it three.
A 5-3 win over Portadown on Tuesday night ended a run of six straight defeats at the Loughshore Hotel Arena but as the previous five were against topsix teams, it was a case of Carrick proving they had found their level and Niall Currie wants his players to prove it again today.
“We had a killer run of games but we took great encouragement from the Coleraine and Larne games and I thought we were worthy winners against Portadown,” said the Carrick boss. “We made it so hard for ourselves, conceding two early goals, but there was a never-saydie attitude from the boys and we’re going to need that for the rest of the season, a crazy schedule.
“But I was just delighted to get a result because we have been better away from home all season so to finally get a win here (only their second of the season) and put that to bed we are over the moon. Saturday is a game we are capable of winning but we’ll have to play better than we did when they were last here.”
That was at the start of December when Warrenpoint “took us apart” and that day, by coincidence, Carrick were bidding to follow up a home win against Portadown.
Currie, though, has the utmost respect for the job opposite number Barry Gray is doing.
“They have gone down south and brought in five or six top-end players and you can see that from their performances and their results,” added Currie.
“They’ll come down here and play with a lot of freedom and will want to do what they did here last time. We’ll just focus on getting to the levels we reached on Tuesday, try to keep a clean sheet and if we don’t concede poor goals we always believe we can cause any team problems.
“It’ll probably be the same team. Although it’s asking a lot of the boys, if we do well on a Saturday I don’t change anything so although it’s only three days between games I’m just applying the same method.
“We might run out of legs, might get more injuries, but the boys are all up for it.”