Well, the Irish League is within days of restarting. Another chapter will be written in the storied history of the domestic game, with thrills and spills aplenty to come across all three flights of the NIFL pyramid.
Worth focusing on in particular is the second-tier, the Championship. This is a place that is manna from heaven for connoisseurs of chaos and unpredictability; a league where scripts are torn up to the point where the playwrights among us don’t dare to lay out their predictions.
Offering a different dimension to the top-level Premiership, where last term’s winners of the second rung of senior football, Loughgall, will reside and bid to upset the odds by surviving on their return to the main table. Below them, 12 institutions will battle hard, dice with danger and go through the motions in order to live their dream of making it to the peak.
11 of those outfits are covered in this preview. The newly-promoted side – just so happening to be the team that this writer follows – will also be in receipt of a tailored place in the coming days. In the meantime, peruse with interest what promises to be a comprehensive and complete outlook on a league that will yield its fair share of shocks and surprises.
Annagh United
Ground: BMG Arena, Portadown, Co Armagh
Manager: Ciaran McGurgan
2022/23 position: third-place (defeated by Dungannon Swifts in Promotion Play-Off) – 59 points
Relative to their final league position, Annagh United’s season took a rather unexpected twist.
Having achieved the right of a Play-Off with their near-neighbours Portadown the previous year, courtesy of a second-place finish in their first campaign of Championship football following their third-tier promotion, their second such showdown came in less orthodox fashion.
Warrenpoint Town’s unexpected demotion to the Premier Intermediate League – a division that Annagh made their step up from in 2020 as table-toppers of a Covid-curtailed crusade – was a gift for the Co Armagh club, given The ‘Point’s return as runners-up was expected to set up their date with Dungannon Swifts in the two-legged affair.
But when the Milltown institution were not handed a licence, Annagh instead received another bite of the cherry.
They almost turned over Dungannon, too, given that Ciaran McGurgan’s men led 2-1 from the first leg at the BMG Arena. Craig Taylor contributed a stunning winner on that occasion.
Although their Tyrone-based adversaries had the last laugh. Ethan McGee and Michael O’Connor ultimately brought the Swifts their Premiership salvation thanks to a 2-0 success at Stangmore Park.
It has not dented the red-shirted side’s ambition, though.
After clinching third-position courtesy of a 59-point endeavour, McGurgan has bolstered his pack with the new recruits of striker Ryan Swan (Warrenpoint), midfielder Declan Carville (Newry City) and defenders Conall Young and Lee Upton (Ards and Portadown respectively) to keep their top-flight dream firmly in the frame. They add further steel to a team that has reprised the services of tricky Taylor, inspirational midfield leader Niall Henderson and crafty centre-forward Stephen Murray among their ranks.
A long winless run failed to dent spirits come their date with destiny, but – as Bangor had learned in September 2022, when this opposition handed them a heavy 4-0 defeat in BetMcLean Cup last-32 action – their high-energy style continually makes them an awkward panel to face. They even dealt a 2-1 upset defeat upon eventual Premiership champions Larne.
Expect trips to the Tandragee Road venue to be testing tussles, with Annagh bidding once more to be near the top of the second-tier tree.
Ards
Ground: Clandeboye Park, Bangor, Co Down
Manager: Matthew Tipton
2022-23 position: fifth-place – 56 points
This lot need no introduction.
The eternal rivals. A flame that has felt too much like a flicker for the liking in recent times, but one that shall burn brightly once again for the benefit of all.
That flame will not take long to ignite, either. Bangor’s very first home outing back in the second-tier is a Friday night North Down Derby; the first such league encounter for seven years and more.
And with the two teams reunited equals, sympathy is expected to hit all-time lows during times of both success and strife.
Former Warrenpoint and Portadown supremo Matthew Tipton is 18 months into the job at Ards, and – inspired notably by the exploits of last season’s Championship top scorer, Adam Salley – brought about a top-half placing. A 10-match winless run in the winter left feelings come the campaign’s end that it could have been better, though, which is why the red and blue-striped outfit have continued to bid for a promotion target.
Salley, a two-time Player of the Month in the division who netted 28 times across 34 appearances, will be a top-flight footballer next season with Newry City. Tasked with covering a hefty void will be former Drumaness Mills sharp-shooter Callum Dougan, a frontman whose record at Amateur League level bodes ominously for opposing sides.
Much change has been afoot in defence, too. With former Knockbreda loanee Max Greer, centre-back Matthew Gorman – ex of Newington – and returnee Irish Cup winner Michael Ruddy coming in to bolster the spine in front of shot-stopper Alex Moore, in place of esteemed figures like popular skipper TJ Murray (Ballymena United) and Conall Young (Annagh United) who have headed for pastures new, a positive start to the upcoming term would surely inspire belief.
Not since their play-off relegation in 2019 have Ards been able to dine at the Premiership table. For their faithful, that is too long.
Expect the 1958 Irish League champions to have a renewed sense of hunger when they stare into a fresh barrel of confidence.
Ballinamallard United
Ground: Ferney Park, Ballinamallard, Co Fermanagh
Manager: Harry McConkey
2022-23 position: eighth-place – 52 points
The one and only Co Fermanagh representative across each of the three levels of the Irish League, Ballinamallard can be said to hold the hopes of an entire region on their shoulders.
Many clubs can call themselves the heartbeat of the place they’re from. The Mallards are the heartbeat of their entire county.
Upon achieving the goal of promotion to the Premiership for the first time in 2012 – indeed, it was a 3-2 success over Bangor that clinched them that prize – the Ferney Park club, whose chairman is the Ulster Unionist Party MLA Tom Elliott, became the first from the western-most part of Northern Ireland to play senior football, and in 2019 achieved a further piece of history when they became Fermanagh’s first Irish Cup finalists.
From that team, Micheál Glynn is an Irish League champion with Larne, while Darragh McBrien has secured a full-time switch to record winners Linfield.
They are also the last second-flight team to reach the showpiece of the 142-year-old competition. Relegated in 2018, this is their fifth successive term in the Championship.
Harry McConkey has overseen their progress of late, and agreed to stay on in the role for the forthcoming challenge of bringing Ballinamallard back into a position of closer contention.
“Last season was an extremely testing and tiring season for everybody, and when you are carrying the responsibility of the results and trying to get the club up and running after the battle of Covid, it takes great energy. I wanted to be sure I had that energy to go again,” the supremo told the Impartial Reporter.
“There were things I needed clarity on in regard to the club’s own ambitions, and that is why I took the time that I did to be sure it was the right decision.
“It was a long, hard thought out decision, but they say hard thought out decisions are the best ones.
“Now that I have made that decision, I want to give it absolutely everything.”
When Adam Neale represented Bangor in the UEFA Regions Cup last October, the Ballynahinch attacker’s exploits came under McConkey’s attentive watch. And, with the seasoned multiple title-winning Mark Stafford reprised as part of his defence, fruitful times in proximity of Lough Erne will be greatly hoped for.
Ballyclare Comrades
Ground: Dixon Park, Ballyclare, Co Antrim
Manager: Stephen Small
2022-23 position: sixth-place – 55 points
Rarely has a team found consistency at the often frenetic second level of the pyramid like Ballyclare Comrades have in recent times.
The Co Antrim club, who booked a top-half finish and an Irish Cup quarter-final last season, have spent an unbroken decade-long stint in the Championship, and can take the claims for the development of a handful of would-be Northern Ireland internationals.
Middlesbrough’s versatile Paddy McNair, who would progress all the way up to Manchester United’s first-team, is a Ballyclare native, who first made the grade at Ballyclare Colts – a partner club of the Comrades – prior to his big move across the water, while former NI features Gareth McAuley and Michael Smith also plied their trade at Dixon Park.
Undoubtedly in the present, though, they wish to put on record their skills at the pinnacle of the domestic game.
The Premiership is their target, and the last campaign revealed much by way of how they hope to get there.
With respected head coach Stephen Small leading the charge – a considerable portion of his pedigree comes from helming the Belfast Met Football Academy that has refined Irish League stars like Paul O’Neill, Jordan Stewart, Joel Cooper, Johnny McMurray and Aaron Donnelly – they play a front-footed approach that gets in the faces of opponents.
The crafty link-up of Darius Roohi and Gary Donnelly is a formidable baptism for Bangor to enter into this term, while the advances of right-back Caomhán McGuinness, hailing from a footballing family that includes Cliftonville Ladies trio Kirsty, Caitlin and Orleigha, will likely also prove a sustained source of supply throughout this term.
Meanwhile, Declan Breen’s loan return between the sticks has also been sealed, as has the permanent reprisal of the services of another player with Cliftonville connections – young forward Calvin McCurry.
All in all, as one member of an east Antrim triangle and with top-flight pair Larne and Carrick Rangers offering the other two prongs, Ballyclare are in no mood to be left out of the party.
They will go out fighting for a clearly defined prize.
Dergview
Ground: Darragh Park, Castlederg, Co Tyrone
Manager: Tommy Canning
2022-23 position: 10th-place – 41 points
Following the previous mention of the sole Fermanagh representative of the Championship is the mention of the only Tyrone team.
Although Dergview were embroiled in a relegation scrap for much of last term, they found a way out and secured their spot in this new iteration.
Now, the mission for Tommy Canning and Co. is to move further away from the drop-zone.
Even though they saw three of their star assets book top-flight switches – top scorer Mikhail Kennedy forged into full-time football with a move to Crusaders, while young talents Oran Brogan and Bobby Deane will look to stake their claims at respective new clubs Loughgall and Glenavon – there is no waiting nor sympathy, and the Dergs must still conjure up answers.
It is close between whether the trips to Darragh Park or Ferney Park are longer for Bangor supporters, as both rank at four-hour, 200-mile-round trips, but with an added motivation for the residents of the former to edge away from their recent perils and closer to the top-six place they attained in 2021-22, waiting and sympathy may not have been traits to worry about much anyway.
Sharp-shooter Kennedy’s 17 goals in league play made up a considerable amount of the side’s season total – precisely a third, in fact, of the 51 they netted in league play – and, therefore, the Derryman’s departure from Castlederg to the capital may call for a fresh goalscoring king to take the throne.
But a culture of experience and professionalism around the place will offer the team energy and vigour as they tackle a time of change.
Nicknamed The Constitutes, Dergview face new trials again this term. But that will motivate them to pile the pressure on their foes.
Dundela
Ground: Wilgar Park, east Belfast
Manager: Stephen Gourley
2022-23 position: fourth-place – 58 points
It was an eventful crusade for Dundela last term; not that this is to be taken as a negative.
A mid-season rebuild, a managerial departure, a cup semi-final and a world away from where they were less than a couple of years ago.
When Niall Currie embarked upon a new challenge as manager of the east Belfast institution in September 2021, he found the club bottom of the table with just one point to their name from their first eight league outings.
By the time Currie departed, returning to his home town club Portadown for a second stint in charge at Shamrock Park, the rumblings were of promotion at Wilgar Park last October.
Their mercurial squad, of which Rhys Annett, Ryan McKay (both Linfield) and Eamon Fyfe (Coleraine) would earn Premiership top-six moves mid-campaign, had shot up the table in a short space of time to the point where some observers contemplated whether the count of top-tier Premiership clubs from the capital’s east could be doubled in the coming campaign.
As others such as Eoghan McCawl, Lee Chapman, Benny Igiehon and Chris Rodgers followed Currie to the Ports, it was Paul Harbinson who then steered the ship as a number of arrivals came through the door.
With former Bangor and Glenavon maestro Andy Hall’s incoming the pick of the bunch, former Ballyclare Comrades supremo Harbinson guided the Hen Run outfit – who had reached the Co Antrim Shield last-four under Currie, where they were defeated by eventual competition three-peaters Larne – to a respectable fourth-place. They were firmly in touch of a place on the hypothetical rostrum until the very last day, when Annagh nudged them by a hair, but, from the collective viewpoint, it was a step in the right direction.
For next term, it is Stephen Gourley who will aim to steer the Duns forward. The former defender, who assumes his first managerial role, has been busy in the summer window; Knockbreda’s dazzling Anto Burns, Larne’s 2004-born prodigy Conall Curran, Stephen Kennedy of Dromara Village sharp-shooting note and midfielders Ian Fletcher and Jake Corbett will all be equipped in that distinctive green shirt next term.
It is, what supporters hope, the tools required for Dundela to make a fresh leap.
Harland and Wolff Welders
Ground: Blanchflower Park, east Belfast
Manager: Paul Kee
2022-23 position: seventh-place – 55 points
What had appeared a relegation battle was a bid for top-six by the end of the campaign.
And while Harland and Wolff Welders just missed out on that aspiration, their second half of the season was a pole apart from their curtain-raiser period.
Around December, signs of a revival were sparked when the east Belfast club – bearing the giant Harland and Wolff-built cranes, Samson and Goliath, that feature ever so prominently across the capital’s skyline – recorded not one but two stunning 3-2 successes from two-goal deficits, defeating Dergview and then Dundela in a packed day-after-Boxing-Day derby feast.
Up to that point, they were languishing in a dogfight at the bottom, desperately picking up every scrap they could to assist them in their battle.
They start this term, though, with their ambitions in a different place.
Paul Kee, the former Institute and Omagh Town supremo, replaced Glentoran hero Gary Smyth in the Blanchflower dugout early last season. One Irish Cup quarter-final and that all-important seventh spot later, they hope to continue building on their progress so far.
Being mere seconds from forcing extra-time against eventual Premiership champions Larne in said last-eight showdown in Ireland’s oldest football cup competition, they have laid bare the notion that they can give anyone a game.
The Welders aren’t lacking in their squad, either. Striker Matthew Ferguson, whose 26 league goals were pivotal to fulfilling their hopes, remains in striped yellow and black despite top-flight interest. The son of Linfield legend Glenn ‘Spike’ Ferguson is also accompanied by the combative Michael McLellan, the energetic Jonny Frazer and, much more recently, David Parkhouse, who has joined following his departure from Ballymena.
And a member of Bangor’s double-winning escapade last year will also aim to bolster the club’s attacking resources – namely, the versatile Jamie Glover, who will aim to fit into the Kee-hole and provide extra fuel for the operation.
The 22-year-old, who rocked Seaview’s foundations when he delivered a top-class match-winning finish in last year’s Steel and Sons Cup semi-final, seeks to lend some of that quality to his new employers.
A front-footed brand of football will be the order of things on the Holywood Road and a push for a top-flight place is not out of their reach.
Institute
Ground: The Ryan McBride Brandywell Stadium, Derry/Londonderry, Co Derry/Londonderry
Manager: Kevin Deery
2022-23 position: 11th-place – 38 points
Avoiding a Relegation Play-off last term when circumstances in the league made their final finish a safe zone, Institute will not want another dice with the drop any time soon.
The Maiden City representatives of the Irish League, they contest their home outings in the Brandywell Stadium – ground-sharing with Derry City while a long-term replacement for the old Riverside stadium is built – this particular sojourn to the north west is one that Bangor supporters have had on their radar for quite some time.
‘Stute, who hail originally from the Drumahoe district of Derry/Londonderry, were forced to move five years ago when flooding caused by the Faughan River bursting its banks resulted in irreparable damage to the club’s home stage.
And having suffered relegation from the Premiership courtesy of the controversial points-per-game metric that ‘finished’ the 2019-20 season amid the height of Covid, the side are hoping to look upwards once more after their recent difficulties on and off the pitch.
Positivity came when Institute were named as preferred tenants for a new ground build in the Waterside region of ‘Stroke City’, a step closer to consolidating their future prospects.
“It has been a long five years since we were forced to leave our ground in Drumahoe due to severe flooding, and then we had the Covid pandemic which really put everything on hold,” club chairman Bill Anderson stated when the good news was revealed in February of 2023.
“We can now look forward with anticipation and excitement to developing a first-class facility for the whole community, and a new home for the club, in Clooney Park West.”
Now, on the turf, they will tackle a fresh challenge with a fresh face on the touchline.
Boss Kevin Deery, who previously guided Institute to successive Championship Promotion Play-Offs in 2016 and 2017, has returned to the club with a new crop of players to oversee. One such addition for this campaign is a player who resides permanently in the heart of many a Seasider – former double-winning captain Tommy Wray, who is back in Irish League football as a new card in the deck for this second-tier iteration.
Deery, who has replaced Brian Donaghey in charge, will be hard at work trying to inspire the 118-year-old institution closer to new glory days.
Knockbreda
Ground: Breda Park, east Belfast
Manager: Colin McIlwrath
2022-23 position: 12th-place (defeated Ballymacash Rangers in Relegation Play-Off) – 33 points
Like Annagh, the well-documented situation at Warrenpoint provided Knockbreda with an unexpected lifeline.
Bottom-place usually equates to automatic relegation, but Castlereagh outfit ‘Breda were offered the chance to save themselves when the Play-Off right was passed down to them.
Expert survivalists over the past number of years, they had an answer once again; a 4-2 away victory against the PIL’s second-placed side, Ballymacash Rangers, was followed by a goalless draw at home that consolidated their place back in the second-tier.
Bangor know depressingly well what it is like to be on the end of a Play-Off heartbreak against this lot.
The trip to Breda Park in east Belfast is one of the shortest in the league for Bangor, alongside Knockbreda’s near-neighbours Dundela and Harland and Wolff Welders, but anguish is a feeling synonymous with this venue.
However it seems to fall, Colin McIlwrath’s men have found a way to make the Championship their home. Be it through the Play-Offs, near-misses or, in the Covid-curtailed 2019-20 season, a player eligibility issue that ultimately kept them out of the intermediate rungs, there are world-renowned magicians who could not cast the spells ‘Breda have in order to keep afloat.
But McIlwrath’s managerial nous, combined with a little bit of fairy dust from the magnificent Anto Burns, has ensured they will tackle another iteration.
They will have to do it without Burns, though, since the dynamic wide man who netted 15 times in their successful relegation stave-off made the switch across east Belfast to Dundela. Ever one to take the mantle, a new hero will have to rise as the club take a new approach.
Newington
Ground: Inver Park, Larne, Co Antrim
Manager: Paul Hamilton
2022-23 position: ninth-place – 43 points
A familiar foe from the PIL days, it will be for the first time ever that Bangor and Newington will face off as senior status teams.
There will be a change of scenery, though.
Where prior tussles were hosted at Solitude in north Belfast, The ‘Ton have relocated to east Antrim and will now play at Larne’s Inver Park for this term.
Clashes with the green-shirted capital club have been nothing if not eventful.
Dating back to when Bangor first returned to the third-tier, one of the lasting memories of the 2019-20 season was a frenetic 5-5 draw at Clandeboye Park, a match in which Gerard McMullan lit up the ground with a piercing 40-yard screamer to help the Yellows take early control before a teenage Ethan Devine – so pivotal a force off the bench in Linfield’s title win in 2022 – struck a brace.
Be it the agonising 5-3 extra-time reversal in the Steel and Sons Cup Semi-Final at Seaview, a 5-0 home hammering or a nerve-wracking 3-2 away success for the north Down visitors, the 2021-22 clashes were pulsating if they didn’t leave you in tears.
Now that Bangor have followed up the former Amateur League outfit as PIL champions, the box-office theatre is expected to continue.
There has been somewhat of a shuffling of the deck among Paul Hamilton’s panel moreover.
Summer arrivals comprise a couple of players Bangor faced at the top end of the third division, including line-leader Zach Barr – he delivered the opening goal for Lisburn club Ballymacash Rangers in the Promotion Play-Off against Knockbreda – and goalkeeper Dean Smyth, whose Queen’s University net Ben Arthurs, Adam Neale and Ryan Arthur rattled when the Seasiders won the title on Dub Lane.
A number of familiar faces from the PIL days remain, too, including all-rounder captain Richard Gowdy, whose consistent displays in midfield earned him the league’s Player of the Season award as a double-winner in 2022.
And with that, on securing survival in ninth to retain their senior place, the next natural objective is to look upwards once more.
Portadown (2022-23 position – 12th-place [Premiership] – relegated)
Ground: Shamrock Park, Portadown, Co Armagh
Manager: Niall Currie
2022-23 position: 12th-place (Premiership) – relegated – 23 points
The Ports’ drop-out from the top-flight last time out was not the proverbial stone-like sink into water that had perhaps been precipitated.
Instead, following the return of Niall Currie to the hotseat, they went down fighting, reinvigorating the belief that there was unfinished business due to continue at this level.
Currie has, of course, stayed on for the next phase. The expectation of a team of the size and stature that Portadown command – after all, no club from outside the capital has claimed the Gibson Cup more times than their renowned quartet under Ronnie McFall – naturally fuels the theory that they will return to the highest level as a renewed force.
Their transfer business has no less reflected that. With Ballymena United duo Ross Redman and Dougie Wilson returning to Shamrock Park, Dungannon Swifts’ midfield maestro Ryan Mayse has also linked up alongside Crusaders defender Gary Thompson. Crossing one side of Craigavon to the other is teak-tough former Glenavon and Coleraine line-leader Eoin Bradley, while Eamon Fyfe has joined on loan from the Bannsiders to boost the attack line yet more.
A plethora of Premiership talent that has dropped down a division to inspire Portadown’s aspired rebirth.
Perhaps there is an awareness that, bearing in mind their possession of a formidable squad, those with the ‘favourites’ tag are there to be shot at.
But a panel that comprises such existing mainstays as captain Patrick McNally, local hero Luke Wilson, Eoghan McCawl and Paul McElroy are not anticipated to feel the heat. Currie, who has achieved the step-up from this league with Carrick Rangers and Ards in the recent past, is also a distinct cool head on wise shoulders who will point his players the way.
A 1994 Steel and Sons Cup winner with Bangor – the shot-stopper in a Reserves side that conquered Lee Feeney’s Linfield Swifts in the showpiece – Portadown native Currie has big ambitions for what the new Shamrock beast can become.
But he knows acutely that the Championship so routinely rips up the script that nothing can ever truly be considered a certainty.
Featured image from Northern Ireland Football League Social Media.
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