Fermanagh’s Premier team manager Derek Sharpe is delighted with his side’s preparations as they get ready to represent the county in the year’s biggest youth competition.

Their warm up games have included victory in the Orchard Cup in Armagh and victory over Donegal Schoolboys. Despite narrowly losing out in a few matches as well, the manager is very happy with the way things have gone. “Preparations have gone as well as can be expected,” said Derek. “The boys have been training very hard and have shown a lot of improvement since we first started. We have had no major injury concerns and in the majority of the games they have done pretty well even though it has been a bit of a mixed bag of results. All the games have been fairly close but we have been putting in good performances and everyone has got good game time as well, which has affected some of the results.” Much of the emphasis before the tournament is on getting a team to gel together despite players playing their normal football for different clubs throughout the county, and Derek reckons the 18 man squad have bonded well. “This year the majority of the lads have played together at Junior level and quite a few have played together at Ballinamallard, but there is obviously a challenge as they are from two different age groups and there are four different clubs involved,” he said. “We have spent a lot of time getting them to gel and link up together, and we have done quite a few team building exercises to get team spirit going.” It is quite an experienced squad with only two players never having tasted the milk Cup experience before, and the manager is confident they will raise their game for the big occasion. “The majority of the boys have been up before,” he said. “We have two boys who have never played in the Milk Cup but the majority have been there before and have experienced it. Obviously they will have a lot of friends and family up supporting them and that will be a great boost for them to settle the nerves.” The matches start with a local derby against Tyrone before they take on former winners Brentford and Lusaka Academy from Zambia, and Derek is hoping an offensive approach will pay dividends. “We want to be attacking as much as possible, keeping the ball on the ground with short simple passes, and supporting each other up through the pitch,” he said. “The group is a good mix of teams. Brentford won the Junior section two years ago with this team and this age group. They beat Liverpool quite comfortably that year. I have been doing a bit of reading up on them and they have beaten Inter Milan and AZ Alkmaar this year as well so they will be fairly good. The team from Zambia have been to play tournaments in Spain and Sweden and Norway before arriving here for the Milk Cup and going by their results they are a useful side as well. We have Tyrone in the first match and we will be setting our stall out to win that game. Obviously bragging rights are up for grabs and a lot of the boys know each other. I fancy our chances of getting a result against them, but it’s a very tough group.”