Caulfield confident Cork City can maintain impressive home record against Rovers

CORK City are confident of maintaining their impressive home record when they welcome Shamrock Rovers to Turners Cross on Friday night.

Cork City manager: John Caulfield.

John Caulfield’s men will be aiming to make it four league wins in a row. They are second in the table, with the visitors in third place, four points behind City.

The home side has six wins out of seven at Turner’s Cross this season and have won their last two home games, against Sligo Rovers (3-2) and Drogheda United (4-1), scoring seven times in the process.

‘It’s going to be a very tight game. They have played 13 games and only conceded two goals away from home, so that shows their intention to keep things very tight,’ Caulfield said.

‘It’s going to be an interesting game. They will probably try and hit us on the counter-attack. They will feel that they can’t come to Cork and not get a result, but we are at home in front of our own supporters and we have a very good home record. We have scored 20 goals at home (in seven games), so I am hoping that we are going to be good enough to open them up and get the result.’

Alan Bennett has returned to training after a hamstring injury, and the defender will be assessed closer to kick-off. Danny Morrissey, who was stretchered off in Tuesday’s EA Sports Cup game against St Pat’s, is ruled out, though there is hope that his injury is not as bad as originally feared. Kieran Djilali and John Dunleavy are definitely out, with both sidelined as a result of knee injuries.