The wait is over; tonight sees the return of the SSE Airtricity League campaign for the 2019 season with all ten teams in action.
Dundalk and Cork City have rotated between first and second for the last five seasons with Dundalk the current holder of the league title. The defending champions go into this season with a new face in the dugout following the resignation of Republic of Ireland manager elect Stephen Kenny to manage the international U-21 side before moving into the senior teams’ managerial hot seat in two years. Kenny has been replaced by his long-time assistant Vinny Perth.
Another man taking charge of his team for the first time tonight is Declan Devine who has returned to The Brandywell, now known as the Ryan McBride Brandwell Stadium in a touching tribute to the former Candystripes captain, for a second spell as Derry City’s manager after they parted ways with Kenny Shiels at the end of last season. Despite winning the FAI Cup and having an excellent win percentage, Devine’s previous spell at the club ended with him getting the sack and he will hope things end better this time
Devine’s side welcome UCD to their newly-named stadium who are returning to the top flight as First Division champions after a four-season absence.
Here’s this weekend’s full fixture list, all matches kick off at 7:45pm unless otherwise stated:
Bohemians v Finn Harps
Derry City v UCD
Dundalk v Sligo Rovers
St Patrick’s Athletic v Cork City
Waterford v Shamrock Rovers
The current defending champion of the Over The Turnstile LOI Prediction League is Rodney McCain so we look forward to seeing how the defence of his title goes.
Our players will get three points for predicting the correct result and a point for predicting the correct outcome. We start with the defending champion:
Rodney
Bohemians 2 v 0 Finn Harps
Derry City 2 v 1 UCD
Dundalk 2 v 0 Sligo Rovers
St. Patrick’s Athletic 2 v 2 Cork City
Waterford 1 v 2 Shamrock Rovers
Cameron
Bohemians 3 v 1 Finn Harps
Derry City 2 v UCD 0
Dundalk 4 v 0 Sligo Rovers
St Patrick’s Athletic 1 Cork City 3
Waterford 0 Shamrock Rovers 3
Bryan
Bohemians 3 v 0 Finn Harps
Derry City 3 v 1 UCD
Dundalk 2 v 1 Sligo Rovers
St. Patrick’s Athletic 1 v 2 Cork City
Waterford 1 v 3 Shamrock Rovers
Darren
Bohemians 4 v 0 Finn Harps
Derr City 1 v 0 UCD
Dundalk 2 v 0 Sligo Rovers
St Patrick’s Athletic 1 v 3 Cork City
Waterford 0 v 3 Shamrock Rovers
Liam
Bohemians 4 v 0 Finn Harps
Derry City 1 v 1 UCD
Dundalk 4 v 0 Sligo Rovers
St Patrick’s Athletic 2 v 1 Cork City
Waterford 1 v 2 Shamrock Rovers
Adrian
Bohemians 1 v 1 Finn Harps
Derry City 1 v 1 UCD
Dundalk 2 v 1 Sligo Rovers
St. Patrick’s Athletic 2 v 0 Cork City
Waterford 1 v 3 Shamrock Rovers
Keith O’D
Bohemians 2 v 0 Finn Harps
Derry City 3 v 1 UCD
Dundalk 1 v 2 Sligo Rovers
St. Patrick’s Athletic 1 v 1 Cork City
Waterford 2 v 2 Shamrock Rovers
We also have our Danske Bank Premiership and League Cup final predictions for all the football north of the Irish border this weekend available elsewhere on our overtheturnstile.uk site today and if you want before all the action kicks off you can read Keith O’Dwyer’s latest LOI article HERE.
If you agree or disagree with our predictions let us know over on @o_t_turnstile on Twitter.
