Emmet Malone previews tonights matches in the Setanta Sports Cup:
Having started last year's Setanta Cup final as firm favourites to beat Linfield, Shelbourne go into this evening's meeting with the newly-crowned Irish League champions badly needing a first win in three over the Northerners or find themselves on the brink of first-round elimination from this year's competition.
"They're a good side, I always said that," says Pat Fenlon. "They showed it when they beat us fairly easily last year but I think we pushed them a good bit harder on Monday in Belfast and the lads all know they have to improve on that again.
"We lacked a little bit of commitment up in Belfast and we haven't quite shown the class we know we possess in a couple of the other games over the last week or two but we've been working hard to put things right and I certainly believe we can do better this time," he says.
Fenlon will benefit from the return of first-choice full backs Owen Heary and Ollie Cahill,who missed Friday's rather lifeless goalless draw with Longford at Tolka Park.
"The game was crap," observes Fenlon, "but it's hard when teams come here and look to get so many bodies behind the ball. The two lads being back will certainly help, you always miss players of that sort of quality and Owen is a natural leader for the whole of the team. We might have Alan Moore (who missed the Longford game with a groin injury) back too, which would be another bonus."
With the league now in the bag thanks to Saturday's 1-0 win at Armagh where Glenn Ferguson scored his 40th goal of the season, Linfield are free to concentrate on the two remaining cups that would give them a rare clean sweep of the trophies available to them in a season.
Tim Mouncey misses this evening's game through suspension while a couple of others are carrying slight knocks but David Jeffrey will be anxious to field his strongest side for a game that, if won, could mark a major step towards the knock-out stages.
Derry City, meanwhile, must put a disappointing Eircom League display behind them if they are going to beat Belfast opponents Glentoran this evening at the Oval and thus assume a commanding position at the top of Group Two.
Stephen Kenny's side turned in their best performance of the competition to date to beat Glentoran at the Brandywell last week and a repeat could well put qualification beyond last year's Irish League champions.
Pat McCourt, Kevin McHugh and Barry Molloy are all available again after missing the defeat to Dublin City through suspension.
Killian Brennan should be in contention after coming off the bench 20 minutes from time at Dalymount.
