McFadden and Cranford aim to maintain unbeaten record

BY MATTHEW WILSON

CRANFORD FC’s Kyle McFadden is hoping that they can maintain their unbeaten start to the season when they make the trip to Deele Harps this Sunday.

The Cranford men have made a solid start to the Division 2 campaign, remaining unbeaten to date with two wins and three draws under their belt.

Speaking to Donegal News, McFadden stated that, despite the couple of dropped points from the three draws, they’re pleased overall with the start that they have had to the season.

“Yeah definitely. We’re still four or five points behind, we possibly would’ve rathered getting a couple of more wins. We dropped a few points with the three draws but you can always be happy enough when you’re unbeaten with five games played.”

The Cranford Park residents shared the spoils with Raphoe Town on home soil last time out, with Oisin Harkin’s 70th minute strike for the visitors cancelling out Shane Coll’s early opening goal.

McFadden expressed that the meeting with Mike Kelly’s outfit was a ‘tough battle’ but insisted that with the competitive teams within the league, there’ll be plenty of games of this fashion.

“It was a tough battle from the start, we knew it was going to be a tough game. There’s a lot of tough teams in the Division now.”

“We’re still unbeaten from five games but we’d three tough draws to start the season. Hopefully the fixtures get a bit easier from now but we know ourselves that it’ll be a battle to get up this year.”

“We went 1-0 against Raphoe Town yesterday and it was a tight slog then. They then levelled with not long left but it was tough the whole way through.”

Cranford FC’s opponents last Sunday have enjoyed a positive start to the season which sees them positioned top of the table courtesy of four wins from their opening five matches.

With the Cranford outfit securing themselves a result which saw the Raphoe men drop their first points of the season, McFadden viewed it as a result that they can take encouragement from. Going forward.

“Yeah definitely. I think they have four wins from five matches and I suppose it was their first points dropped of the season so we just have to take it on from here now and try to get as many results as we can.”

Danny McBride’s side have been fairly solid defensively so far in the Division 2 season, with them conceding just five goals in their first five matches.

Only three teams in the league have conceded fewer goals than the Cranford men to date and McFadden feels that the connection between goalkeeper Jason Hegarty and the backline in front of him has a lot to do with this.

“Over the last four or five seasons we’ve been playing with the same back five. The goalkeeper and the four defenders get used to playing with each other season in and season out.”

“It’s just about building that understanding between each other. The more you get used to playing with each other, the more you get used to conceding less goals.”

After two seasons in Division 1, the Cranford men suffered relegation back to Division two last term following a ninth place finish.

They’ll certainly want to right the wrongs from last year and bounce back immediately, with the Cranford midfielder stating that the aim within the group this term is to gain promotion back to Division 1.

“It was a couple of years ago that we won the play-off to stay up against Kerrykeel but when you’re dicing around with it for a few years then you can always see it coming, especially losing a few men and stuff.”

“The goal this year would definitely be to get promoted and even possibly go on to win the league but promotion is definitely the big one.”

Next up for the Cranford Park residents is an away fixture against Deele Harps this Sunday.

This weekend’s opponents are another side who have enjoyed a positive start to the season, sitting second in the table with 12 points out of a possible 15.

McFadden expressed that beginning with Raphoe Town last weekend, it was a run of fixtures that the side were eyeing up and he’s hopeful that they can maintain their unbeaten record when they make the trip to Martin Duffy Park.

“We were looking at this stretch of three games, we had Raphoe yesterday, Deele away next weekend and Whitestrand the week after that as well.”

“They’re three teams that will be right up there pushing with us pushing for promotion so they’re three huge games.”

“Hopefully we’ll be able to keep the unbeaten run going. We got a point last weekend so if we could end up with seven points out of nine then we would definitely take that.”