Sligo Rovers -v- Derry City

• Christopher Davey
• Sat, Aug 15 2009


Usually with cup competitions, form can be thrown out the window and the underdogs can hope of putting one over on the favourites. Today is not one of these encounters however, as not but 4 days ago a drilled Derry side delivered Sligo to the depths of despair by beating them 4-0 in the league. The consequences for the North Western sides from this result are contrasting, as Derry further cemented their place in the top four whereas Sligo languish second from bottom, with only Bray saving them the embarrassment of being last.

It is not last weeks' victory, but the manner of it which leaves Sligo fans awaiting another thumping today. For sixty minutes, Sligo competed with Derry, before crumbling due to a lack of fitness. This "crumbling" has been evident in all of Sligo's games of late, whether it was being dominated by Galway despite having a numerical advantage, or conceding three in thirty minutes against Dundalk, and I expect today to be no different, as fitness won't improve in the course of four days.

Sligo go into today's game missing Ger Rafter and the influencial Gavin Peers due to injury, who will accompany Michael McGrath in the stand due to the fact of the former Galway man being cup-tied. Stephen Parkhouse has left the club, but Sligo will be boosted by the return of Conor O'Grady from injury and Rommy Boco from international duty. Derry's squad remains largely unchanged from last night barring the suspension of Kevin Deery who will join the long term injuries of Mark McChrystal, Sammy Morrow and Liam Kearney.

Ahead of the game, Derry Manager Stephen Kenny spoke to journalists, giving his thoughts on the game. "It was great to see Mark Farren back amongst the goals with two great finishes in what was a good performance on Tuesday night in our league encounter with Sligo. The team can take confidence from that performance, scoring four goals and to be honest I think that we have been threatening to do that for a while. We have respect for Sligo who have some good players in their squad but as usual we will concentrate on ourselves and look to take that form into an important cup game. Being the cup I would expect that we will take a good crowd to the game which gives it an edge and we must try to come away with a positive result."

Extratime.ie Prediction: Get down to Paddy Power's and lump on the Ernesiders, there's only going to be one winner in this one.