Caulfield warns City ahead of Richardson return

With four SSE Airtricity League Premier Division games to go for Cork City, the go-to cliché is that each one is a cup final.

Trailing leaders Dundalk by three points, however, City manager John Caulfield knows the margin for error has been taken away and there is no looking beyond tonight’s game against Drogheda United at Turner’s Cross (8pm).

“The way I look at it is that we have one cup final,” he said. “We can’t afford to take our feet off the ground or look anywhere else, any points that we drop now will really hand it to Dundalk.

“Everybody seems to have given Dundalk the league, all the people on television are saying that they’re home and dry and we’ve probably been a pain in the backside for everyone because we’ve hung in there, even though we’ve been written off all season.

“If we can go out on Friday night and put in another good performance and hopefully get the result, it means we can keep the pressure on them. If we keep doing that, we might get to the situation where we’re going there for the last game of the season with the league still at stake, which would be fantastic.”

Caulfield acknowledges the important role played by the home support during last week’s come-from-behind win against Sligo.

“Even at half-time last week, going in 1-0 down and having been on the back foot, the fans were still clapping and saying there was 45 minutes left,” he said.

“Maybe in other places, they might have been booing but down here there’s a real bond between the players and the supporters.”

Once upon a time, there was a bond between the City fans and current Drogheda manager Damien Richardson, who had two spells in Cork and led the club to the league in 2005. While a warm welcome for Richardson is expected, the friendship won’t equate to a gift of three points.

Caulfield added: “For me, it’s a difficult one. I was a player when he came first and I was in the stands in 2005 and ’07 when he won the league and the cup.

“At the same time, I know Damien and while he’ll say all the nice things about Cork, he’ll want to make sure he comes down and spoils the party because that’s where he’s at the moment.

“We have to be on our guard, he’s a good man to talk it up and we have to make sure that we don’t get fooled by what he’s saying because the three points are the most important thing.”

Meanwhile Dundalk have suffered a major blow with the news that striker David McMillan will miss the remainder of the title run-in with an ankle ligament injury incurred in the Lilywhites’ 2-0 win over UCD on Friday.