Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
SADDLE UP
Blues pull clear but Cooper is ready for bumpy ride
THOROUGHBRED Linfield winger
Joel Cooper is eager David Healy’s men keep the blinkers on in the final strait of the title race.
The reigning champions eased six points clear at the top of the Danske
Bank Premiership with a commanding
4-1 win at the Ballymena
Showgrounds last weekend.
But while the league table makes pretty viewing for Blues fans, the lightning quick Cooper isn’t looking beyond tonight’s title shootout with
Crusaders.
“I don’t really look at the table at this stage of the season - I don’t think anyone does,” he said.
“We have to take it game by game. All you can do is look at the next game.
“Crusaders is a big one and we’ll have to be ready. It would be massive to secure a win, but we know we’ll have to be at our best to get a result.”
While fellow title rivals Coleraine, Cliftonville and the Crues – who lie eight points off the summit – boast a game in hand, Cooper is content to have points in the bag.
Healy’s men have also built up a head of steam with three wins on the bounce against Dungannon (2-1), Warrenpoint (2-1) and David Jeffrey’s Sky Blues.
“Other teams have a game in hand, but I’d rather have points on the board,” said Cooper. “Other clubs didn’t play in the league last week, so it was a big win for us at Ballymena.
“It was probably more sweet that we were 1-0 down away from home and came back to win comfortably in the end. It showed a lot of character and belief.
“We maybe haven’t been at our best for periods this season, but it showed at Ballymena that we really believe in each other and trust each other to win important games.”
Linfield’s paucity of form against top-six clubs – just five wins in 12 league meetings this season – was recently flagged up by striker
Andy Waterworth.
And with eight of the Blues’ last nine games coming against top-six clubs, Cooper knows it’s a record that has to be addressed in the run-in.
He said:
“Every game is the same and you get three points for any win in this league, but obviously we’d love to take wins against the top-six.
“We need to improve on that and hopefully we can do that now that we have a bit of momentum. We’ve won three on the bounce and hopefully we can push on.”