Suspensions hit busy City side hard

Cork City are missing George O’Callaghan, Kevin Doyle and Danny Murphy for tonight’s clash with UCD at Belfield Park in their re-arranged Carlsberg FAI Cup second round clash.

All three are serving one-match bans.

Tonight’s game will help clear their backlog of fixtures for City who have four league games in hand as a result of their Intertoto Cup run.

Tonight’s visit to Belfield Park to play the joint leaders of the First Division is a tricky one for Pat Dolan’s boys.

Cork have been hard pressed over the years to win at Belfield Park and UCD remain one of their bogey teams.

City may well give a senior debut to former Reading and Barnet midfielder Joe Gamble with Billy Woods coming in as cover for Danny Murphy at left-back.

In the middle, Greg O’Halloran may get a rare outing or Nigerian Michael Nwankwo may be asked to play out of position on the right wing.

Either way it’s a tough cup-tie for Cork who face three games in six days.

A Munster derby against Waterford United on Friday night (7.45pm) is followed by another difficult away assignment at second placed Drogheda United on bank holiday Monday at United Park (7.45pm).

“It’s no exaggeration to say that our whole season could hinge on two results now against UCD in the Cup and Waterford in the league, it's vital we get the wins,” Dolan told the Evening Echo.