Longford Town face play-off challenge against Cobh Ramblers

Longford Town look to make it three-home wins in-a-row when they welcome Cobh Rambers on Saturday night.

Town are unbeaten in four first division games having beaten Wexford and Kerry and drew away to Waterford. However St. Pats scored a 2-1 FAI cup victory over Longford last week.

While a good return for Longford, the arrival of Shane Keegan’s Cobh is a serious test. Cobh are third in the league table and are battling for a play-off place.

With Galway United runaway league leaders, Waterford are 10 points clear of Cobh. Yet just nine points separate Cobh from eighth placed Longford.

Stephen Henderson added 22-year-old midfielder Charles Mutawe to the squad mid-week. However, Evan Farrell has departed.

Cobh have won three, drawn one and lost one of their last five league games. UCD scored a 3-2 victory over Ramblers in last week’s FAI Cup first round game.

For Ramblers Jack Doherty, Jason Abbott, Darragh O’Sullivan Connell and Tiernan O’Brien all returned to the squad last week. While Luke Casey is available again having been cup-tied for the UCD game.

“We’re really looking forward to heading up to Longford on Saturday” Cobh Ramblers boss Shane Keegan told the Cobh Ramblers website.

“It’s our first time having back to back defeats in quite a while and when that happens you’re mad to get out and rectify things. They’ve had a real bounce lately”.

“I know they were defeated by Pat’s in the Cup but they put in an excellent performance and gave it a real go” added Keegan.

“When we went up to Longford earlier in the year we were poor and we’ve spoken about how to avoid that this time around. This will be a tough one and it’s up to us to bring our best or we won’t get anything from the game.”