LOI: North Battle South As Dublin Braced For Derbies
As faith would have it the League Of Ireland is yet again overawed by a second consecutive batch of Dublin derbies. St Patrick’s Athletic fully capitalised last week when they emerged as the only winner and in doing so moved joint top of the table. Few would bet against the Saints slipping up this time either but Shamrock Rovers will now doubt be eager to overcome managerless Shelbourne.
Elsewhere a mouth watering north v south battle takes place as Cork City make the long trek to the Brandywell to face Derry City in a must win game for both. Read more
This week’s Airtricity League series features four league games complimented by a Setanta Cup Final between Shamrock Rovers and Drogheda United. Despite the season still being relatively young we can already get a fair idea of who will challenge at the top and who will be cast adrift at the bottom but such is the unpredictability of the league that results could surprise us at any instance. The pressure at the bottom is certainly heating up and some big games this season will determine whether the race for the drop will be exclusive to the three teams who already look destined for relegation. 
Week 11 came to a close Friday evening, around quarter to ten, and we knew exactly who stood where. Ian Baraclough knew his side had dropped to second place after title chasers Derry City had won and unforgettably his side, had not. Sligo picked up just the point after they could only muster a draw at Shamrock Rovers.
It was a game that had been circled by both sets of supporters for several weeks as the dreaded “relegation six pointer”. UCD were in confident mood coming off the back of an impressive 2-0 victory over Shamrock Rovers. That game had also marked their first clean sheet of the season but from early on it looked like this might not be the case at Tolka Park. 
