Recently installed Cobh Ramblers manager Ian Butterworth will be hoping to come through his first real test with flying colours this evening when his first-division side take on championship leaders St Patrick's Athletic for a place in the last eight of the Harp FAI Cup.
Butterworth, whose playing days included spells with Nottingham Forest and Norwich, admits that he has come to Ireland to learn his new trade. He knows that a victory for Ramblers over the Dubliners tonight at St Colman's Park would be the sort of achievement which would help him to catch the idea of bigger employers back in England over the coming seasons.
St Patrick's, he concedes, will start the game as hot favourites "but they won't be all that happy about the prospect of coming here," he says. "They're in a different league to us at the moment and people will be expecting them to beat us two or three nil but this is a tight little ground, our players will be up for it with nothing at all to lose. And with a big crowd behind us you just never know what's going to happen."
Since his arrival, Ramblers have kept up the run of form shown under caretaker manager Liam McMahon with good wins over Limerick and Bray as well as a draw with Galway which Butterworth felt should have gone his team's way.
"We should have won that to qualify for the Shield final but we were a little unlucky on the day. Still, I have an honest bunch of lads here and some very good young players which is a good thing for the future and I know, whatever happens we won't make it at all easy for Pat Dolan's team."
Among the other clubs looking to score upsets over premier division opposition are Galway United, Athlone Town and St Francis with Don O'Riordan's side appearing, on paper, to have the best chance of turning over Finn Harps.
United have been boosted by the speedy recovery of Ryan Lucas but Harps manager Charlie McGeever remains confident that if his men play to their potential, they can book their place in the quarters. "It's very much in our own hands," says McGeever who must cope without cup-tied new signing Tommy Callaghan (a son of the former Galway manager of the same name) for the game.
"If we go there and play the way we are capable of playing, then we'll win but if it not it'll be like last year at Wayside where the attitude just wasn't right and sure enough we lost the game."
Both Athlone and St Francis will be depleted for their matches, with Liam Buckley giving late fitness tests to Johnny Morris Burke, Shane Curran and Stephen Lally, at least two of whom he expects to sit the game out, before the clash with Shamrock Rovers. Pete Mahon must cope without the suspended Noel Griffin and Terry Berry.
