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Clarke’s Glenn starting to find their feet

By Shaun Casey

FOLLOWING their promotion from Division Three last season, Glenn took a bit of time to find their feet at the higher grade, but Stevie Clarke’s men are right in the mix for back-to-back promotions.

After 13 Division Two league games, Glenn are currently in third position, joint with second placed side An Riocht, with five matches remaining. “

We got promoted out of Division Three last year and it took us a while to adjust,” said Clarke.

“There were a couple of factors, we took a bit of time to adjust to the new rules. There are things that you thought would work and they didn’t. We had a couple of injuries at the start of the year that sort of derailed us.

“We won our first two games and then we lost four on the bounce but the type of division this is, it’s all very tight. Bredagh’s probably the standout team at the minute.

“Outside of that, anybody could beat anybody on any given night, and one or two big teams are unfortunately going to go down to Division Three.”

Glenn and An Riocht are on 16 points, closely followed by Bryansford and Rostrevor on 15. Drumgath, Saval and Castlewellan are all still in touch as well with 11 points.

“There’s nothing guaranteed and at that start of the year, we wouldn’t have made any big goals or anything, it’s the first year in a while that we haven’t because we just didn’t know what way we’d be with player availability,” Clarke added.

“We said we’d take it until this time of year and if we were still in touch with the top then we’d give it a go but there’s four teams sitting within striking distance of promotion and those other sides, if they put a run together, they’ll end up right up in there.”

Glenn have been missing their county men, Shay Millar, John O’Hare and Paddy Brooks, but that’s given Clarke a chance to blend in some new blood.

“We have three county men and they’ve been away the whole time. We had Oisin Murphy and Odhran Byrne on the u-20s as well, so we didn’t have access to them at the start of the year.

“But it’s been great because there’s nine minors that are eligible to play senior and that has been a brilliant influx into our squad. Last Friday night, there was three of them starting, which has been the same most weeks.”

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