Derry City snap up stylish forward Micheal Glynn from Ballinamallard United

DERRY CITY boss Declan Devine has added talented teenager Micheal Glynn to his squad ahead of Sunday’s pre-season clash with Bray Wanderers at the AUL Complex in Dublin.
Micheal Glynn pictured scoring for Ballinamallard against Crusaders, has signed a short term deal with Derry City.Micheal Glynn pictured scoring for Ballinamallard against Crusaders, has signed a short term deal with Derry City.
Micheal Glynn pictured scoring for Ballinamallard against Crusaders, has signed a short term deal with Derry City.

The versatile former Ballinamallard United youngster, who also plays Gaelic football as a full forward for Derrygonnelly Harps, has signed a deal at Brandywell which runs until the summer initially.

Glynn was part of the Ballinamallard team who reached the Irish Cup Final in 2019 and has represented N. Ireland at U17 level and Devine is delighted to have added the frontman to the group as Derry continue pre-season preparations this week.

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The League of Ireland Transfer Deadline has been extended until next Thursday but Devine insists he’s now happy with his current squad.

“We’re happy with what we have at the minute,” he insisted. “I brought a very talented young player in yesterday from Ballinamallard, Micheal Glynn. “We’re grateful to Harry McConkey for allowing us to bring him in as obviously they can’t play any football until the summer.

“So we’ve brought him in to see how he gets on and that will be us in terms of the squad. We’re more than happy with what we have.”

Derry got their pre-season campaign off to a flying start with a 5-0 win over Finn Harps at Brandywell on Tuesday night with goals from Danny Lafferty, Nathan Gartside, an own goal and strikes from new signings, Will Fitzgerald and Will Patching.

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Devine understandably wasn’t getting carried away with the performance or result and claims there’s still lots of work to be done before the opening game of the season against Longford on March 20th.

“It was a brilliant run out for 90 minutes. I was grateful to get opposition. We’re only two and a half weeks in so the game didn’t tell me anything I didn’t know. We are reasonably fit, reasonably sharp.

“So it didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know. The boys have been brilliant in terms of their togetherness, their work ethic and appetite to get better.

”It wouldn’t have mattered if we were playing Dundalk and lost the game. The reality is, it was 90 minutes. Some players played 65 minutes and the most pleasing thing was everyone got through it unscathed.

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“The first preseason game is never really that important other than getting everybody through it and that’s the pleasing aspect for me.”

As a former goalkeeper, Devine wasn’t expecting his No.1 to be on the scoresheet but more importantly he has been impressed with Gartside’s performances in training.

“We got two from set-pieces, Danny Lafferty scored a header, Will Patching scored a goal and it’s well documented our goalkeeper scored one.

“I’ve never scored a goal in my life,” he laughed when asked did he ever find the net as a player. “I’ve given a few away but I’ve never conceded from another goalkeeper and never even got close to scoring one myself so full credit to Nathan.

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“Nathan would be first to tell you that the most important thing for him was he played in goals. It’s unusual for a goalkeeper to score a goal but fair play to the young fella. He’s been outstanding in preseason but he would be first to hold his hands up and say there was a bit of luck involved.

“The one pleasing aspect for us was the boys enjoyed playing with each other and looked quite comfortable but that could change overnight. We’re not getting carried away. It was a fantastic workout but that’s all it was.

“I’m not getting too carried away with things. There’s a lot of creativity in our team and a lot of power and we have the ability this year to make sure we can score goals from set pieces.

“We got two from set-pieces in the practise game but there’s still a lot of work to do. At the minute we’re just getting to know each other and how each other plays.

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“The competition for places this year is going to be absolute rife. They’ve all got to chip in with more goals. We’ve also got to make sure we’re hard to beat. So far so good.

“Every single player has really bought into the values of the club and have all enjoyed being around each other. There’s a long road ahead. We’re two and half weeks into a 46 week season. We certainly have a lot of work to do between now and the Longford game, that’s the reality of it.”

Derry face Bray on Sunday before taking on Finn Harps for a second time next Wednesday at Brandywell as Devine continues to experiment with his squad.

“With the players we’ve got in and the players we’ve kept, it gives us an adaptability to our team. I think we can play a number of ways.

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“We lined out in a 3-5-2 the other night given the players that were available. Patrick Ferry didn’t play because of injury, James Akintunde didn’t play because we didn’t want to take a chance due to a couple of niggles he had.

“Players will only play a certain amount of minutes against Bray but everybody is looking forward to the game. We’ll be going into it quite tired because we will work extremely hard going into the game.

“It’s not like you would prepare for a league game. The boys will run really hard today and tomorrow but there will be a lot of tired legs taking to the pitch on Sunday and that’s the way it needs to be.

“They have to learn to play tired and whenever they are feeling like that they have to know how to manage their bodies as best they can.”

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