Finn Harps will bring their 2012 First Division campaign to an end tonight (SAT) when they welcome Longford Town to Finn Park (kick-off 7.45pm).
Harps will be looking to end the season on a high, and still have an outside chance of finishing in fourth spot.
A much improved second half of the season has somewhat been overshadowed by two defeats on the bounce in each of their last two outings. Having lost narrowly by the odd goal in three to Waterford at Finn Park two weeks ago, Harps then fell to a 2-0 defeat against bottom side SD Galway in Terryland Park last Friday night.
“It was very poor, probably the poorest we’ve been in a long time,” said Harps boss Peter Hutton of last week’s performance. “I think subconsciously the players maybe thought it was going to be easy. We didn’t test their goalkeeper anywhere near enough and I think it showed that they wanted it a lot more than we did. They were more motivated and are fighting not to finish bottom.
“But we shouldn’t have been lacking in motivation or desire because fourth place was still on the table for us going down there. We knew it was always going to be a tall order to try and finish fourth because of the gap between ourselves and the other teams. But, having gone on the ten-game unbeaten run and put ourselves in such a strong position, it’s disappointing that we didn’t see it out,” he added.
Hutton will be looking for his troops to finish the season on a high on Saturday against a Longford Town team who saw their automatic promotion challenge fizzle out with three defeat in their last three games. However, Tony Cousins side still have a chance of going up via the play-offs.
“Similarly to ourselves, they have been beaten in their last two games. But they’ll want to go into their play-off on the back of a good result to have their confidence up, so we’ll be expecting a fairly strong performance,” said Hutton of Longford. “That’s what you want, though. We wouldn’t want them coming up and not being competitive – it doesn’t do anybody any good.”
“It’s hard to believe it’s the last game of the season, it has fairly flown in,” he said. “It would be nice to finish off with a win, particularly because it’s also our final home game and we’d like to reward the fans who have been fairly loyal to us, especially when the times have been tough. From my point of view, I just want to see a good, solid ninety-minute performance. The last couple of displays we have let our standards drop; we have been complacent.”
Although Longford have only recorded eight victories in 38 attempts at Finn Park, four of those wins have come in each of their last four visits to Ballybofey.
The three previous meetings between the sides this season have all finished in away wins.
Last week’s 2-0 defeat to SD Galway was the first time that Harps had failed to score in a match since losing 3-0 away to Limerick at the end of June. Harps haven’t failed to score at home since Waterford United left Finn Park with a 1-0 victory five months ago.
On the team front, Hutton welcomes back Ciaran Coll and Matt Harkin who missed the trip to Galway last week through suspension. Adam Clarke is a doubt though with a thigh injury.
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