Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
YESTERDAY’S RESULTS
CYRNAME will be fitted with blinkers again as he bids to regain his Betfair Ascot Chase crown on Saturday.
Paul Nicholls’ chaser, who won the race in 2019, but fell 12 months ago, disappointed in the King George on Boxing Day, and the trainer said: “I just think he was getting a bit lazy, racing behind the bridle, which isn’t like him.
“We worked him in them, and they made a big improvement. It’s just to sharpen him up really.”
Cyrname faces four rivals, including stablemate Master Tommytucker.
LIMERICK boss Billy Lee says six weeks would be ‘ideal’ preparation time before games return – but reckons they’ll only get four ‘at the max’.
Lee’s fifth season with the Shannonsiders definitely won’t begin until at least Easter.
They’re keen to kick on after securing promotion in 2020 and pushing eventual Munster champions Tipperary hard in the Championship.
Inter-county activity is scheduled to come first when restrictions ease though a condensed campaign could mean very little preparation time.
Lee told the What’s the Score Extra podcast: “My personal view would be six weeks. What sits behind all of this is that we want to look at new players, who we’re bringing into the squad, to give them a fair crack at it.
“You’d probably want a couple of challenge matches but of course prior to getting to that point you want fellas doing a bit of ball work on the field as a group, working on the technical and tactical side of things.
“That would give fellas the best chance at it but time might be against us this year and that just throws back a scenario that we’ll have to manage in the background.
“But ideally I would say six weeks. It seems like we’re only going to get four at the max so we’ve just got to wait and see and deal with it.”
Limerick enjoyed a strong 2020 season and finished with an All-star nomination for Iain Corbett – the county’s first in 10 years.
Lee said: “The lads got a lot of belief and confidence in themselves from winning games at the start of the year last year, from the Mcgrath Cup on into the League and even winning challenge games was important.
“We’ve built it up year on year and we’ve stretched ourselves year on year.
“That’ll be no different this year.”
Watford v Derby DAVE ARMITAGE
7.45pm
WAYNE ROONEY has told his Derby players not to get carried away with their blistering run of form.
The Rams have won five of their last six games going to Watford tonight.
But rookie boss Rooney warns: “We could be dragged back into trouble.
“Staying in this division is crucial. It’s a crazy league and you can jump or drop three or four places with one result.
“I’ve never once spoken to the players about the league table. Whether they do and talk about it among themselves, I don’t know.
“But what I would say is you can’t be happy being in 17th place. I hope looking at the table doesn’t help them because they’ll see us there in 17th.
“I wouldn’t be happy with that – and the players shouldn’t be. What we’ve done over the last couple of months has been great but we still find ourselves down towards the bottom end.
“However, we are in very good form and I believe we can go to Watford and get three points – and I believe in this Derby team.”