Horgan hoping to hit the ground running at UCD

Finn Harps manager Ollie Horgan is hoping his new look Harps side can get off to a good start in their season opener away to UCD tonight.

Horgan is eager to get the Harps season up and running after last week’s clash with Drogheda United was postponed due to inclement weather.

“But now we’ve got to get up and running with two away games, both at the weekend which is a very difficult start.”

Ollie knows how tough the trip to South Dublin has been for Harps in recent years, having won just once their in recent years in the 2015 play-off.

“We’ve had bad bad days in Belfield, I can only remember one time we’ve actually won there in the last 8 and a half years.”

While Harps didn’t play last week, they’ve more more setbacks this week with a couple more injuries picked up, but Ollie is hoping the new players can hit the ground running.

“The lads who have played in the LOI know what’s expected of them, the lads from other countries it might take a while for them to find their feet and that’s the worry of it, I just hope they find their feet cause they’re good lads.

“We’ve lost a good amount of players, its well documented and its very difficult to replace one person never mind 11 or 12 but that’s what we’ve been left with and I’m not making excuses, we’ll know better (where we’re at) after Tuesday night after we’ve played two games.

“You don’t want to pick up injuries and the lads haven’t played a competitive game since last November and we’re going into 2 games in 3 days.”

 Horgan is looking forward to the beginning of the season and is happy that his side are in the top division for a fourth successive season but knows it’ll be a tough task staying in the league one again.

Horgan said: “We’re delighted to be in the division and delighted to have 36 games to look forward to and we’ll need to pick up some points in the first couple of games and in the first month to stay in touch.”

Ollie addressed the familiar faces in the UCD side as he praised their work last season. Donegal trio of Sam Todd, Jack Keaney and Michael Gallagher all in the students side. William O’Connor is also assistant manager at the club.

“Sam and Mikey player wise and O’Connor was at us for a couple of years and they did brilliant last year to get promoted and they deserved to beat a very good Waterford side.”