Peter Cherrie never thought Derry City would be fighting for survival on final day

The experienced stopper returns to his former stomping ground at Turner's Cross tonight for a match of huge significance in the relegation fight.

Following the club's eighth defeat of the league season against Shamrock Rovers on Saturday Derry go into the final day needing a point to avoid a relegation/promotion play-off date with Longford Town.

The Candy Stripes are in seventh spot level on 19 points with Shelbourne who entertain Rovers tonight and two ahead of North West rivals Finn Harps who host Waterford at Ballybofey.

Given their superior goal difference a point against already relegated Cork City tonight will be enough but Cherrie doesn't expect the Rebels to be wearing their 'flip flops' or having downed tools ahead of the match.

"We knew it was going to be tough coming here to Tallaght, they're the champions, especially since the boys haven't trained in two weeks and you could see they were tired out there," said Cherrie after Saturday's defeat which has left Derry sweating on final day.

"We were camped in for a while and the legs maybe started to go a bit and Rovers showed their class in the end.

"It was a cracking free kick (from Graham Burke) but that's the kind of quality they have. They have a great squad and are able to rotate whereas our guys were really tired and it showed there tonight.

"Now it's a massive game for this club and all us players on Monday night in Cork. Every team in this league are all playing for contracts and all have something to play for. We just have to get the result we need to stay up."

Derry were expected to kick on this year after finishing in fourth spot and securing European football in 2019 and Cherrie certainly didn't expect to be struggling at the foot of the table.

"We never thought we could be in this position at the start of the season especially after finishing fourth last season, fighting to stay away from relegation but that's the way it is now.

"We have to rise to the occasion and produce the result we need down in Cork. We have to pick ourselves now, hopefully train on Sunday and Monday and get ready for Cork."

City boss, Declan Devine will be hoping champions Shamrock Rovers can do his side a favour and defeat Shelbourne tonight.

However, he ultimately won't want to be relying on results from elsewhere and is fully aware of the potential perils should they fail to get a result in Cork.

"We need a result," said Devine. "Other teams need results. There's a lot to be played for on the last day of the season. We're disappointed we didn't get something from this match but ultimately we know what the consequences are if we don't win.

"So we know we're going to Cork and we're preparing as well as we can. It would be great to get out and train in Cork tomorrow morning (Sunday) and we'll do a bit of training again on Monday. Getting a bit of training time will be key for us."

When asked if he was confident the players could recover from Saturday and produce a winning performance against Cork, Devine responded in the affirmative.

"Absolutely. I think we made changes at the right time to try and keep people as fresh as we can.

"We're missing a lot of players here tonight. We're missing Colm Horgan, Stevie Mallon, Ibrahim Meite, Mark McChrystal, we're missing my assistant manager.

"So it's been a really difficult couple of weeks but at the same time the lads that are in the changing room I'll not let them get too down beat about this. It was always going to be a big ask but we'll get ready now for Cork on Monday."