Danny Lafferty believes mid-season break will help his old club Derry City

​The Candy Stripes face Cork City at the Ryan McBride Brandywell Stadium this Friday night and although they sit six points behind leaders Shamrock Rovers, Lafferty believes Derry can close the gap on the champions.

Lafferty, who won the SSE Airtricity Premier League title with Stephen Bradley’s men in 2020, says the topsy-turvy nature of the top flight this season means anything can happen.

The Sligo Rovers defender even uses ‘The Hoops’ slow start to this season, when they failed to win a game in their opening six league games, as an example

“I know Derry are capable of closing the gap again,” he insisted.

“You look back earlier in the season, people were saying stuff like ‘Rovers are so many points behind and so on’. Then, all of a sudden, they put four or five wins together, maybe even more than that, but getting a few back to back wins and getting on a run is huge in this league.

“All of a sudden, if you keep your head down and start ticking off victories as they come, you can make ground. But the minute you lift your head, you could be right down in the mix.”

The 34-year-old, who was part of the Brandywell dressing room last season, knows how much Derry manager Ruaidhrí Higgins and his back-room team want to bring success to Foyleside.

“I know how ambitious Ruaidhrí and all his back-room staff are,” he explained, “And without doubt they definitely have the quality of players in the squad to close the gap again. I also have no doubt that they will turn things around again.

“Every team in our division suffers a dip in form at some time of the season and prior to the break Derry had a wee bit of a bad spot. But I have no doubt coming back after the break, having got recharged and refreshed, they'll be ready to hit the ground running again.”

The former Northern Ireland international played his part in the Bit O’Red’s recent win at the Showgrounds over his old club. Lafferty admitted that was a big victory for John Russell’s side, who went into the game having lost three games on the bounce.

“It was a massive result for us that night, because we haven’t had a great spell leading into the break,” he added.

“We know ourselves as players we have been off it and we needed to stop the rot of defeats. We did that thankfully against Derry that night and we got a point away at Shels (Shelbourne) before the break.

“To pick up a big result against Derry in front of our own fans was very good, but I have to say I think Derry might have let us off a bit that night because the quality they possess is second to none. I think the early goal in the game helped us.

“The first goal in our league is so important and on the night we got our noises in front and then we just tried to see it out.

“It was a very hard fought win for us but although we were down to 10 men, we still have a few chances to score a second goal.”