UCD's manager Pete Mahon reckons Terryland Park is the best staium on Ireland. Read here>>>>>>
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'Clubs have to make people want to attend their games'
On Friday night, we take on Derry City at The UCD Bowl for the first match in our new stadium. The club was in Belfield Park for a long time and there are a lot of memories attached to it, but you can’t allow memories to halt progress.
In Belfield Park we were on the periphery of the campus, so much so that I think most students didn’t even know where the stadium was. Now we are right in the middle and that has to be seen as a hugely positive move. We all really hope that this move will lead to more students coming to our matches.
But it’s not just the location, the whole infrastructure is better in The UCD Bowl. The stand, the dressing rooms, the toilet facilities – the new stadium is a big improvement. The pitch is not as good quality as Belfield Park at the moment but that will change. The rugby team have one more game left on it and then we are bringing a UK-based company over to work on the pitch. By mid-April the pitch will be back to how we want it.
We are entering into a very positive era in the League of Ireland. This is the second year of the FAI’s five-year plan and it is an exciting time. Lots of clubs are planning new stadia – Finn Harps, Bohemians, Shamrock Rovers, to name a few – and that is going to have a big effect. Other clubs have already made big improvements – the new stand in Terryland Park makes that the best stadium in the country, I think.
Clubs have to make people want to attend their games. If you build the facilities, they will come. As part of the UEFA Pro-Licence course, I was over at Charlton Athletic and that club really is the model for the League of Ireland: they are a community-based club in a fantastic stadium.
The product on the pitch is there, so we need to give spectators the modern facilities they require to get them into the matches.
There are so many positives in the league at the moment. We have a group of young managers with a very positive attitude on how the game should be played; we have better players coming into the league; and we have a very competitive league on the pitch. The future is very bright.
From UCD’s perspective, we know that this is going to be a tough season. We have lost a lot of players and the younger players are going to have to step-up. We thought we had the makings of a really good team when we had the likes of [Darren] Quigley, [Shane] McFaul, [Gary] Dicker and [Conor] Sammon but they have all moved on and the young lads now have the opportunity to show what they can do. They have won medals at Under-21 level, now it’s their time to step-up.
Every season we unearth young players but that is because we work very hard at it. We go to schoolboy games every weekend looking to bring the best players in and give them a platform to show their talent.
We have had our best ever pre-season. We have played six times and won five, conceding only one goal. We have picked-up no injuries and training has been very good so we are definitely looking forward to getting the season underway again.
