Buckley hoping the ‘Bit O’ Red’ can hit ground running
By Daire Walsh
PERRYSTOWN’S Liam Buckley will be seeking to begin his third season as Sligo Rovers manager with a bang when 14-time Premier Division champions Dundalk visit The Showgrounds on Saturday (kick-off 6pm).
The Bit O’Red enter the new campaign on the back of a productive 2020. A fourth-place in last year’s top-flight earned Sligo a spot in the inaugural Europa Conference League – UEFA’s tertiary club football tournament, which is set to get underway in July.
Buckley has been busy during the off-season, recruiting the likes of Colm Horgan, Richard Brush and Greg Bolger (who was a vital component of his league-winning St Patrick’s Athletic side in 2013) to his squad, which finished a single point adrift of Dundalk in the 2020 Premier Division table.
“We’ve a few players in and a few players out, so hopefully the ones we have in can land running and we can go better on what we achieved last year,” Buckley told The Echo.
“We played them [Dundalk] twice last year and we beat them twice. The year before we beat them and they beat us, so there hasn’t really been much between us over the past couple of years.”
Of course, Dundalk have been themselves in the transfer market, with Alessio Abibi, Sonni Nattestad, Sam Stanton, Raivis Jurkovskis, Ole Erik Midtskogen and Jesús Pérez all arriving at Oriel Park from overseas clubs.
There has also been a shake-up to their backroom staff in the past couple of weeks with Filippo Giovagnoli now taking on the role of first-team coach and Shane Keegan moving from opposition analyst to first-team manager.