Roes will have to find another gear or two- Tracey feels

INTERMEDIATE C’SHIP QUARTER-FINAL

MAJOR improvement will be required from Owen Roes if they are to upset on-song Eglish in the Intermediate quarter-finals this Friday night, manager Barry Tracey accepts.

While the ‘boys in black’ were engaged in a high-quality thriller against fellow contenders Coalisland last time out, in contrast the Roes laboured somewhat before eventually pulling away from basement strugglers Stewartstown in the second half of their low-key encounter.

Inevitably captain Cathal McShane led the scoring stakes with nine points to his name, while Dara Dooher slotted away the only goal in a 1-17 to 0-7 stroll. Barry Tracey accepts though that Eglish represent a massive step-up in class this weekend.

“ When Eglish came out of the draw the first thing that came into your head was how well they did in the first round. That match with Coalisland was the match of the first round no doubt.

“ It was a brilliant game particularly in the second half and we will certainly have our work cut out for us.

“ There is a few fires to put out, obviously Ethan Jordan but all over the pitch in fairness. They are strong around the middle, and defensively as well, and then obviously they have their talisman up front (Jordan) who is a difficult proposition.”

The one major injury doubt concerning Tracey surrounds full-back Peter Kirk who left the fray early in the Stewartstown match, but whoever lines out for the Glenmornan men, Barry expects them to give their all.

“ We still have concerns with Peter’s fitness which could be a race against time. But you have to face up to those things in Championship football. We will be there to compete. We gave a good account of ourselves in the league against Eglish.

“ In the first half we stayed with them before they pulled away midway through the second half. At that stage they were unbeaten in the league. They finished up sitting in second place and were fully deserving of it as well.

“ We are under no illusions about how tough a task it is going to be but we will try to give a good account of ourselves and will see where that takes us.”

Reflecting back on the Stewartstown match Tracey was just relieved to secure the win and move on, albeit conceding that they will have to step it up a notch or two for Eglish.

“ We beat Stewartstown really convincingly a few weeks ago in the league without Cathal, but that gave a false picture and in the first half of the Championship match we were anything but convincing.

“ We had six scores from seventeen shots. That can seep into the players, with one mistake leading to another mistake and confidence and belief can drain away.

“ At half-time there was no shouting at the lads, everyone stayed calm. It was about keeping on playing and trusting the process. I think the turning point was the ’45’ where Aidan (Hegarty) and Damien (McCrossan) carved out a two pointer. That set us on our way but was it a classic absolutely not.

“ If you saw the classic that Eglish and Coalisland served up in Dungannon 24 hours earlier our game didn’t compare but that is two teams on a level. We know if we repeated that against Eglish it wouldn’t be good enough.

“ Even on league form and the way we finished the league we know our strengths. The only teams who beat us were the top four teams. With Coalisland gone we would consider ourselves now one of the top four teams but the Stewartstown performance wouldn’t have reflected that.”

However on the plus side Tracey still felt that there was still plenty of encouraging individual performances that he was pleased with against the Harps.

“ Damien McCrossan was very solid all night and Callan Doherty got up and down the line really well. Gerard Devine was tremendous and even at the end Stephen Kelly got in that block on the line. He could be looking to go into nets the next day with that dive although he would have a job on his hands to get Ryan McShane moved.”