INSTITUTE: New signing Doherty poised for debut

Institute could give new signing Ryan Doherty his competitive debut, as the 2016/17 season gets underway at Moyola Park, in the League Cup, this Saturday (KO 3pm).
Institute's new signing Ryan Doherty is on-loan from Derry City until at least January.Institute's new signing Ryan Doherty is on-loan from Derry City until at least January.
Institute's new signing Ryan Doherty is on-loan from Derry City until at least January.

The midfielder along with left-back Gareth McFadden have signed on-loan from Derry City and boss Kevin Deery is happy that his squad is now virtually complete ahead of the campaign.

“We have added Ryan and Gareth, but Ryan has a tight hip flexor but I don’t think it’s too serious,” he said.

“Unfortunately Gareth is away on holidays for a week, but he’ll come back into the squad when he returns.

“The agreement is that both of them are on-loan until January and Kenny Shiels will come out and watch them quite frequently and he’ll view it and if they are doing extremely well then I would imagine its Derry’s option to take them back.

“But if he’s content enough with their development then he may feel a full season with us will benefit them more, but we’ll wait and see. Either way they are with us until at least January.

“Look what I have now in terms of my squad I’m very content with apart from needing another goalkeeper, which I will continue to work and once we get a goalkeeper I’ll be very happy with what we have.”

Deery is delighted his side didn’t, like so many teams, receive a bye in the first round of the League Cup, as he wants more game time.

“We have missed a couple of games because of one thing or another but I’m really pleased with what we have,” he added.

“I saw a lot of clubs got byes in the first round, but I’m happy we have a game and the players I feel who deserve to play will be involved.

“Look you watch training and you know who’s ready for it and maybe some other people in the group might have a wee bit more to go.

“But I’m a manager who picks people who are on form in training and how they play in pre-season and that will be the case on Saturday at Moyola.

“But as people know you are never too sure after pre-season, you know better after three or four weeks of the season, but I’m confident with the players we have and hopefully we can have a good start to the season.

“We are playing a D&D Select team at Drumahoe on Wednesday night (KO 7.45pm) and the plan is that most players will get 45 minutes and we might play two teams so that players get game time ahead of Saturday’s opening match of the season.”

While before this evening’s game ’Stute fans will be holding a supporters meeting at the ground.

The meeting in the supporters room will get underway at 7pm sharp.

Related topics: