Athlone Town (H)

[culloty82]

A few short months ago, this would have appeared a straight forward home win to mark the refurbishment of Mounthawk Park, but the Midlanders have been reinvigorated by their change of ownership, and last week's victory over Harps made a statement that no team is likely to get cut adrift at the basement this season. As for the Kingdom, one shot on target over the course of 90 minutes in the capital speaks for itself, and with the side getting cut to ribbons at the back, vast improvements all round will be required to make any progress tomorrow. On the plus side, stand tickets appear to be selling very well, which should ensure a crowd of 7-800 in attendance, and while it certainly won't be an easy game by any means, home advantage may help us grind out a narrow win to really kickstart the season.

[Zico]

An improved performance on last week, but definitely nowhere near where it needs to be. I would not panic yet though, it’s a long season and circa 45- 50 points makes the playoffs.The positives -More energy in the first half (dropped off in 2nd half badly though)Improved performance from Birmingham and MurphyWe do look solid at center half Bargary and Kelliher still to come in!!The negativesCentral mid offers no creativity - Borden and Brookwell look similar types of player and neither showed any willingness to take control of the game and receive the ball off the back 4Full backs offer nothing going forward- just don’t seem athletic enough to get up and down the fieldO’Connor all over the place for their goal - got his angles all wrong (two errors in 2 games now)Attendance of 674 for first game of the season is disappointing- I did think it looked a lot bigger tho!!

[listowelceltic]

More energy about the team definitely but clueless on how to break Athlone down. You felt if the game went on another 5 hours we wouldn't have scored against a limited Athlone side. Healy i felt was slow to change things. Definitely some fine tuning needed in midfield. Connors position must be in doubt also after 2 poor games.
Credit to the club on the ground last night. Looked well with the new lights and pitch.

Decent enough crowd and fair play to the 20 or 30 Athlone fans who travelled.