By Jonathan Brown
CONALL Burns, Castlewellan Forest’s player-manager, says the squad are throwing their full focus behind winning the KitRoom Shield following Saturday’s 5-2 defeat to Downpatrick in the Harry Clarke Cup quarter-final.
“The cups are always our target, realistically, because we don’t have the squad to compete in the league with the likes of Ardglass, Strangford and Killough.
“We’ve entered into the KitRoom Shield, so we’ll be in with the Division One teams and now we’re looking at opportunities to progress,” Burns said.
Forest, who were the reigning Harry Clarke champions, were dumped out at the quarter-final stage despite going 2-1 up against Downpatrick in the first half.
Downpatrick had taken an early lead through Declan Dowie before Sean Fitzsimmons levelled the scores. Scott Kinley then put Forest ahead before the away side pulled away in the second half, with Dowie bagging two more goals to complete his hat-trick.
It was Forest’s 14th defeat of the season in all competitions.
The Bann Road men have just three league points and sit bottom of the Premier Division table.
Burns, who has been playing with the Castlewellan club from a young age and took over the managerial reins at Forest in 2023, explained some of the problems they’ve faced in this campaign.
“The main thing has been player availability.
“It’s various forms of that in terms of players that we had last year not being available or not committing to another season. There was a number of injuries to players who played last season, suspensions as well.
“And then on top of that, our first team have really encountered the same problems which obviously has a knock-on effect on us as a seconds’ team.
“There’s lots of weeks were we’ve maybe had six, seven, eight players who would have played not available to us and we can’t get away with that.
“That’s been the biggest challenge for us this year.”
Forest have the third-worst defensive record in the Premier Division, with 39 goals conceded.
However, Burns says it’s the way in which they’ve lost games, rather than the sheer number of goals they’ve shipped, that’s concerned him most.
He cited an 8-4 loss to Killough and a 5-1 defeat to Strangford earlier in the season as prime examples.
“There was a couple of games where we let ourselves down a bit, in terms of throwing the towel in a bit early.
“Killough scored eight goals against us, if anybody was at the game, yes, they were better than us on the day, but that scoreline wasn’t a true reflection.
“We were 1-0 up against Strangford and they went and scored five (goals). We were going relatively well against them and then we concede three goals in the space of 20 minutes.
“It’s just those type of things more than the amount of goals we’re conceding.”
Putting the ball in the back of the net has also proven to be a problem for the men in green, netting just 18 league goals, the worst scoring return in the division.
“We’ve had eight games this season where we’ve lost by only one goal, so that’s probably a true reflection of how we’ve been doing.
“Scoring goals has been a problem for us and it’s been a problem for us for a couple of seasons now, but when you’re conceding a couple and you find it hard to get a goal, it’s going to make life difficult.”
“We’ve been close, we just haven’t been good enough,” Burns explained.
the Forest player-manager also believes the Premier Division is more competitive than ever this year.
“No disrespect to the teams in the Premier Division last year or the year before, but there was always a couple of fixtures that you would look at as ‘nice’ fixtures where you’d be expecting to get a win. I don’t think there are any fixtures like that this year.
“We played Celtic Bhoys (who are second from bottom of the league) and we felt they were much better than what they were last season or the season before.
“You look at Drumaness (Mills Reserves) who came up from Division One, we played them in the first game of the season and they were a strong team.
“We played Ardglass the other week and obviously they’re top of the league and we’re bottom of the league. They beat us 1-0, but on another day, it could have been a draw.
“I think throughout it’s a stronger division and a more even division, which is good to see.”
Following Saturday’s defeat, Burns is hoping to finish what has been a disappointing season so far on a high and remains hopeful that Forest can have success in the KitRoom Shield.
“In terms of the league, we have Celtic Bhoys and Ballynagross both to play – we’re looking at those games hoping to pick up wins. We have Strangford to come to us as well, which will be a tough game.
“Hopefully we can kick on and finish the season strongly and you never know (what could happen).”
