Storms don't last forever says underfire Derry City boss Tiernan Lynch
THE STORM clouds have been gathering over Derry City in recent weeks but Tiernan Lynch is confident this current storm will blow itself out and urged his players to 'hold tight' and 'stick together' as they look to end a six-match winless run in Dundalk.
"As we keep saying internally, you don't become a bad team overnight," said the Derry boss.
"You don't become bad players overnight. We are going through a little bit of a storm at the moment but at some stage storms always blow themselves out and we have to hold tight.
"We have to stick together and see our way through the storm. How long it lasts, we don't know. It's up to us to do everything in our power to try and put it right.” There’s been no shortage of adversity for Lynch over the past number of weeks with fans losing faith but it’s only made the Belfast man more determined to succeed.
"This situation we’re in now only makes you more determined to get it right. It’s not a position we want to be in or envisaged ourselves to be in. There’s no quick fix or a wave of a wand where you just turn it around. You got to go through the pain. Take all the criticism that comes your way. You work as best you can to get yourself through it.”
Victory over Dundalk at Oriel Park on Friday night would go some way to relieving the pressure on the Brandywell boss and he believes they have something to build on after a second clean sheet of the season against Sligo on Monday night.
"The only way you put that right is try to get some wins. There were positives from Monday which was the clean sheet but ultimately we’re not here to get clean sheets and draw games.
"We’re here to win games. They are games we should be winning and there’s a lot of games we should’ve won and didn’t for whatever reason.
“It’s roll your sleeves up, stick together and keep ploughing away.”
Influential skipper Michael Duffy remains sidelined with a quad injury while goalkeeper Brian Maher is out with a broken bone in his wrist. Patrick McClean is rated doubtful while Dipo Akinyemi sustained a knock on Monday and is being monitored.
The good news is the return of Cameron Dummigan, James McClean and Carl Winchester in recent days and their experience could prove crucial against a dogged Dundalk side.