KEY GAMES FOR BANN

IT’S going to be a big weekend for Banbridge Hockey Club with two games which will play a vital part in the Havelock Park side’s bid for silverwear on all fronts.

Cookstown are first up on Saturday in the 1918 Premier League with Annadale providing the opposition on Kirk Cup semi-finals day on Sunday.

The league game is taking priority in the mind of Bann coach Mark Tumilty but that is not to say that he doesn’t want to get his hands on the Kirk Cup.

“The league game is more important for me, I would rather have the three points to be honest,” he admitted.

“A win over Cookstown would give us a real shot at Lisnagarvey in the league, especially given that we are playing them in a fortnight.

“It won’t be easy for us against Cookstown, but they have four or five players missing from last year’s squad so I am hopeful of getting a result.”

The game against ‘Dale follows on Sunday afternoon.

“They have been inconsistant this season but have improved recently, they’ve actually put together a run of results recently so we will be doing our best to stop them from building on that,” she said.

“I believe they were unfortunate in their game against Garvey recently so I’ll be expecting them to come to us with all guns blazing.”

He added, “If you were to ask me if we could win both games I would have to say yes, I think we can.

“We should be capable of it, especially given that both games are on waterbased surfaces after playing on sand against Weston and Bangor at the weekend.

“Hopefully we get out of the weekend unscathed with no injuries but we will be missing Stephen Dowds who has been getting a bit of physiotheraphy on his injury while Simon Magowan will be back after serving his suspension.”

Saturday’s game at Coolnafranky starts at 2.30pm while the semi-final at Havelock Park on Sunday is down for a 3pm start.

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