Ballinamallard Utd. (A)

Glenavon is on the road again with a trip to Ferney Park, Fermanagh to take on the basement club Ballinamallard United, following Tuesday’s excellent win at The Oval.“Respect” was a key word in Gary Hamilton’s preview when we spoke to him this afternoon. “The last time we played Ballinamallard it was one of those games when everything went right for us but they went to Coleraine the other week, a team that’s in really good form at the moment, and by all accounts they maybe could have sneaked a draw. We know that, no matter who you play in this league, if you don’t play to your potential then every club has a chance of getting a result against you.

“Tomorrow is probably going to be one of the most difficult games for us so far this season because it’s about going down there with the right mentality; you’re playing against a team that’s fighting for everything, they want to stay in the league, they want to be Premiership players and to do that they need to get points on the board. Every game’s like a cup final to them and we have to be able to match that tomorrow and meet it head on and play the way we’ve been playing with the energy and attitude that we’ve been playing with. If we do that, and with our ability, then we give ourselves the chance of winning the game, as we can in every match, but if we don’t match them up in terms of their fight and their battle and their desire, we could be overturned as is possible in any game in this league.

“It’s a massive game for us tomorrow, it’s a potential banana skin, as I’ve always said in previous years, teams can’t continually be beaten and not picking up points. It has to turn at some stage when teams are on a run like this, they’re always dangerous so we have to be bang on with our mentality and hopefully come away with three points, that’s what we want to do. We can’t afford to have any complacency tomorrow so we will go and treat it the same as if we were playing Linfield or Coleraine or Glentoran or any other team that we play in this league, we have to show them the same respect. Gavin Dykes is someone I respect a lot and I’ll be showing him the same respect that I show any other team so our players have to show their players the same respect on the pitch and go out and play as if they’re playing against any other team and hope they do the business.”

James Singleton returns to the team after serving a one game suspension in Tuesday’s game against Glentoran.