Holders must travel to face familiar foes

 FAI CupHolders Derry City will have to survive a trip to old rivals Finn Harps if they are to successfully defend the Ford-sponsored FAI Cup after being drawn against their neighbours in the third round last night.

And St Patrick's Athletic must beat Eddie Gormley's Bray Wanderers if they are to maintain their hopes of going one better than last year by winning the trophy for the first time in more than 40 years.

Harps have the usual array of city old boys amongst their ranks with manager Paul Hegarty, players Shaun Holmes and Stephen Parkhurst likely to relish the visit of the Brandywell outfit.

Derry City skipper Peter Hutton certainly feels the game will generate a huge amount of excitement locally with the two sides not having met competitively since the tail-end of the 2005 season when the Donegal club was relegated.

"The Dublin clubs are probably fed up looking at each other but we'll be looking forward to that and the fans will love it, you can't beat the local derbies.

"The rivalry would be there even if there wasn't the connection with Paul and the other lads that have played with City before. And it'll have that bit more of an edge because we haven't played each other for a while in a competitive game. It's a great draw."

Gormley, like Hegarty, will get to take on his former club when the games come around during the week ending August 19th and Bray Wanderers captain Clive Delaney will also be aiming to put one over on former team-mates.

That game is one of just two to involve two top-flight sides with Waterford United drawn at home to Sligo Rovers in the other.

Cork City would expect to overcome the challenge of Kilkenny City fairly comfortably given that they are at home but UCD will face a tough test at Oriel Park where they must go in order to take on first division leaders Dundalk.

Of the three non-league sides, meanwhile, just one was drawn at home with Bobby Browne's Malahide United side handed the opportunity to take on Bohemians at Gannon Park.

For Douglas Hall and Fanad United difficult away games await with the Cork club handed a trip to Limerick 37 and the Donegalmen obliged to travel to Flancare Park.

In the days when the various league seasons coincided, Longford's current troubles would have left them looking a little vulnerable to an upset but Fanad boss Ollie Horgan concedes that his side will do very well to avoid defeat against the Premier Divisions side.

"It'll be very hard to get anything out of it," he says. "We've only finished up a few weeks and the lads probably won't get back together properly until the start of August, so it'll be like a preseason game for us.

"The only good thing about it is that there isn't a huge amount of travel involved. It could have been Douglas Hall away and we wouldn't have wanted that. At least with Longford it won't involve an overnight."

Third round draw

Finn Harps v Derry City
Limerick 37 v Douglas Hall
Dundalk v UCD
Waterford United v Sligo Rovers
Bray Wanderers v St Patrick's Ath
Longford Town v Fanad United
Malahide United v Bohemians
Cork City v Kilkenny City
Scheduled for weekend of August 19th