Derry manager not surprised by 'classy' Boyce

Derry City vs. Bohemians  |  Ryan McBride Brandywell Stadium |  Friday, 7:45pm

Tiernan Lynch believes that fans are finally starting to see the best of Liam Boyce, with the striker brimming with confidence following his hat trick heroics in recent games.

Those six goals in three games have taken Boyce to double figures in his first season at the club, and sent an emphatic message to his manager that he is still a huge threat despite the recent arrival of striker Dipo Akinyemi.

It is a problem that the City boss is delighted to have with his selection of strikers hungry to prove themselves and hungry for more and more game time. Boyce’s early struggles at the club now seem a distant memory with the former Northern Ireland international a very key player in City’s hunt for trophies this season.

“Everybody knew the quality of Liam Boyce but you can definitely see that out there in training at the moment. He's starting to really find his feet. He's starting to do things that come very naturally to him now rather than overly thinking things.

“There’s always going to be that transition period for every player that comes into a new league, trying to understand maybe a new system for him that we're playing.

"He's probably playing a slightly different position than what he played and made his name playing at Hearts, so we never had any doubt that his quality would shine through and that's starting to show.

“Boycie's the type of character who I don't think lacks any confidence. There's certainly no arrogance in him but I think he always knew he would settle and when the chances came he would take them and I think you're starting to see that now. Even in training where he's got himself back fit, He's hungry and those wee bursts of class you're starting to see.”

One of the most notable aspects of the FAI Cup win at Treaty United last week was that Derry City scored three goals from corner kicks. That takes Derry’s tally of goals scored from set-plays this season to 11, and Lynch admitted it is an important aspect of today’s game.

“I’ve just seen a stat of the set pieces that were scored at the Club World Cup and it's massive now in the game,” he acknowledged. “The amount of time being spent on teams and clubs and managers in actually bringing coaches in who are specifically working on just set-pieces. It can be the difference of getting into the next round of the cup or three points on Friday night or not so it's hugely important.”

Lynch remains adamant that there’s much more to come from his team. Despite collecting five wins and one draw in the last seven games, and scoring 18 goals in the process, the manager still thinks his team have yet to hit their heights.

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“I still think there's so much more to come from us in how we want to play and what we want to do as a team in and out of possession,” he explained.

“I think there's definitely signs of the things we want to do but I don't think we've reached our heights and certainly haven't reached the consistency that we need to get ourselves to, especially if we're going to talk about challenging for league titles.

Liam Boyce celebrating his hat trick against Waterford in his last game at the Brandywell. (Photo: Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile)

“We know that and it's not something we're trying to shy away from. It's not an elephant in the room. We're very open and very honest about talking about where we are; the good things that we're doing; the things we need to improve on and where we want to get to. That's a work in progress.”

Brandon's available/ He trained very hard this week. He's obviously playing a little bit of catch up as far as it being preseason in his own domestic league before he came here but he's a lad that has obviously played at a very high level and you can see that he's looked after himself. It's just about match fitness now for him.