Derry City FC: All roads lead to Tolka as Derry face league champions Shelbourne

Defender Hayden Cann will go straight into the Derry City squad for tonight's league opener at Shelbourne after signing a contract at the club this week.

The former Drogheda United and Dundalk defender has played in recent pre-season games against Institute, Ballymena United and Glenavon and becomes the seventh new signing of the close season.

Cann’s addition comes just ahead of a huge night at Tolka Park as Tiernan Lynch’s takes charge of Derry City for the first time at the home of league champions Shelbourne.

The man who led Larne from the NIFL Championship to Premier Division glory and European history beyond that is now looking to write a new chapter in his career, hoping to bring similar levels of success to his new club.

“Obviously, we haven't had any games yet so the fans haven't had a reason to turn on me just yet,” he laughed. “I hope that they don't. I hope we have a great relationship knowing that everything we do, we do it 100%. It will never be for a lack of hard work.

“Everything is about mindset and how you look at things,” Lynch insisted. “You look at it as a great challenge and really enjoyable. Our big thing in this is that everything a football club does should always be about the fans.

“It should always be about the people that pay in the gate. One of the things that we've made it our business is that we want to try and play a brand of football that Derry fans have been accustomed to over the years.

“I see the DNA and the philosophy very much of Derry City Football Club about being a team that wants to go forward and be exciting and enjoyable to watch and getting people off their seats.

“I'm not quite sure that winning 5-4 is going to be something that will be good for my heart rate or anything like that. That's definitely not something that I'm going to try and implement.

“We do want to keep the back doors shut and, by all means, be exciting going the other way. I hope we can do that for them.”

Lynch has worked hard to set Derry City up for the season ahead, with his decision to push the club to seal a deal with the Derry GAA County Board for the use of Owenbeg’s state-of-the-art training facilities arguably his most important decision to date. He has also brought significant experience to the club, with former Northern Ireland internationals Shane Ferguson, Gavin Whyte and Liam Boyce clocking up over 100 international caps between them.

His first test in a new league could hardly be tougher, at the home of current champions Shelbourne, especially as he is missing a number of key players through injury already.

Midfielder Cameron Dummigan has been ruled out for the long term with a hamstring injury, while Robbie Benson and Danny Mullen will miss the first few weeks of the season.

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Whyte and Pat Hoban meanwhile are lacking minutes having barely featured in pre-season. But Lynch insists nothing will be decided on game day one.

“Winning against Shelbourne, losing against Shelbourne, drawing against Shelbourne won't make or break our season,” he said. “I've been asked 50 times already where we'll finish this year in the League.

“These are things that you'll never ever get off from me. All we'll concentrate on will be Shelbourne. We always go one game at a time. We'll never look too far ahead. All our preparation will be about us. We work very much on what we need to implement, what we need to do. We try to be very strategic in what we do as far as the team's concerned. As far as the opposition's concerned, it will only be Shelbourne.”