Coa v Newtownbutler

Saturday August 29

in Roslea, 3pm

Coa and Newtownbutler lock horns in the first of the Junior Championship games of the weekend, with both sides hoping to make an early mark on the competition.

Coa have played some positive football under Gary Donnelly this year in the league picking up their first win in two years against Brookeborough.

Newtown have had a poor run, not helped by a long list of injuries, with Conor Maguire the most recent addition following a serious injury in his side’s last league game.

Newtown manager, Vinny Wimsey will be able to welcome back Ronan McLaughlin, Jimmy Maguire and Damian Mohan and he hopes this boost of strength to this squad will help revitalise their season against a difficult Coa side.

“When it comes to championship football there is noone that can be taken lightly. It is an open book and it’s on the day.”

Wimsey is calling on his players to bring more consistency to their play, which he says had only been seen in patches throughout the league.

“We are just not consistent in the way we are playing but we have to get off to a very early start on Saturday and hit the ground running.

“We can’t sit back and do what we have been doing chasing eight to10 points deficits.

“Any championship game you win is hard earned. We know ourselves we haven’t been consistent. The long term plan was to get a championship win for them and that plan hasn’t changed.

“Training has been going well and the attitude has really soaked in.”

Coa have had a more encouraging league campaign than their upcoming opposition but manager, Gary Donnelly, knows from previous experience that league and championship are two different matters.

“We’ll not be reading too much into that. We have been in a situation where we have been at the lower end of the league and then championship turns things around. I’m sure Newtown are looking at same sort of idea. I’m sure they will be ready to give the championship a rattle.”

Donnelly’s side have been buoyed by some impressive performances in the league as well as the return of some players who were unavailable for one reason or another.

“Last year we had a few boys who were injured or couldn’t commit due to work and few boys retired so we were completely depleted.

“This year those boys who had injuries are back now and then a couple of lads with the shorter season came back in and a load of younger lads in from U17 helped and added a bit more freshness and everybody is pushing each other on.”

Doubts remain over the availability of county captain Eoin Donnelly who has missed a number of league games through injury but Coa have welcomed Cathal Beacom back and he will add another scoring threat to their forward line.

Both managers know that a win on Saturday will do wonders for confidence.

“We are getting a bit of strength back into our squad just at the right time,” said Wimsey.

“We have been training well this last two weeks and the boys are chomping at the bit to get at the championship,” commented O’Dwyers manager Donnelly.