'We want to be an unbelievable football team' - Institute boss Kevin Deery

Ards vs. Institute - Clandeboye Park, Saturday, 3pm

Institute head to Ards this weekend hoping to build on their recent improvement by winning three successive league games for the first time since last November.

After suffering four successive league defeats, ‘Stute have bounced back emphatically, scoring two late goals to win at Ballinamallard before dominating Newington at the Brandywell last week, winning 4-0, their biggest league victory in 11 months.

It is the response that manager Kevin Deery needed.

“We've cleaned up a slight bit of the mess we've made for ourselves, but we've a lot of work to do still,” he said afterwards.

“Clean sheets are massive in this league. For me, that's the biggest positive from the win because we've leaked quite a few goals. We do look a real danger going forward. We've got pace and power. We've got good running power and good aggression in the final third. We just need to clean up a wee bit because I think we could have had more goals there as well, but you can't argue with a 4-0 win. As I said to the players, this means a lot to me to play here as well. I'm glad to get the monkey off our back with our first home win.”

A first clean sheet of the season, two more goals for teenage striker Padraig Lynch and maximum points from two games – this is more like the ‘Stute team which performed so well throughout last season.

“At this level, we want total control, we want to be an unbelievable football team,” Deery continued. “But we're at a level where we've got a lot of amateur contracts, so we have to be effective, we have to play forward when we see boys making forward runs, and we've done that really well. But for me, that's a big quality, for attacking players, that they want to run on behind, they want to go and stretch teams. I think it's gone out a lot of games now, it's usually wide crosses in the box, but we're the one team where we have attacking players who want to run and stretch teams, and it was very effective for us.”

While the points return so far has not ben what he may have hoped, the improvement in attacking areas is noticeable, with ‘Stute five goals better off already then they were after eight league games last year.

“We have a lot more of a cutting edge in our play this year,” Deery acknowledged. “Obviously we've lost key personnel, but for me that's never been an excuse. We've lost a lot and that's an excuse, but we've enough in that dressing room to climb this table and be really competitive this year again. That's the only thing I want to promise, is to be really competitive.”

Promising debut

Another positive from the Newington game was the debut of former Derry City midfielder Tiarnan McGinty, who is certain to gain valuable first-team experience under Deery.

Kevin Deery wants his team to play positive, attacking football.

“That's brilliant for Tiernan, because I think he's only had 45 minutes of football in three months or so. It wasn't a gamble for me throwing him in, we know what we've got,” he said. “He's only coming 19 in January, so he'll be a key player for us. I know he's chipped in with a few goals at senior level, and he can do various roles, he can play off the right as well, and he can be aggressive out there.

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Before last week, Ards had their share of troubles, but a surprise win over league leaders H&W Welders has changed their perspective significantly.

“It's a Jekyll and Hyde league,” Deery acknowledged. “We just have to focus on ourselves, and I think if we get that willingness and running power in our game, and the calmness and composure that we scored our goals, we'll hurt two season in our lads. It's a difficult 3G up in Ards, it probably hasn't been re-laid in quite a bit, but we have a good record up there to be honest, I think last year we won nearly every time we went there, bar a 97th minute equaliser against Bangor, because they both share, so we've got a good record up in that ground, and we intend to go up there again and impose our style on them, and have a go at it.”