Linfield's visit a special test for Fenlon

SETANTA SPORTS CUP SEMI-FINAL, FIRST LEG/Bohemians v Linfield:LINFIELD'S PETER Thompson recalled this week how, when he was growing up, Pat Fenlon was a popular figure amongst the Northern club's fans although the Dubliner might argue he had a little more about him at the height of his playing career than being "small but a battler" as Thompson chose to characterise him.

Fenlon’s standing at the club has never been in doubt, however, and a portrait still hangs on the wall at Windsor where he is widely and fondly remembered for scoring one of the two goals against Glentoran on the last day of the season in 1994 that snatched the league title from under the noses of Glenavon and Portadown.

The 41-year-old, whose Bohemians side face Linfield in the first leg of their Setanta Sports Cup semi-final at Dalymount this afternoon, fondly remembers the experience too, not least the open-top bus ride through the club’s heartland not long after the last-gasp league victory.

“We were third in the league going into the last day; Glenavon and Portadown were ahead of us and they were playing each other,” he recalls. “They drew while myself and Dessie Gorman scored the two goals to win the league. It all probably went over my head a bit in terms of the enormity of it to people in the club but we had a trip up the Shankill after we won the cup to do the double. And when you see your picture in the windows of shops on the Shankill Road, it’s a hard explain to people! But,” he adds, “it was a fantastic time and I have the height of regard and respect for the club.”

After mentioning the celebrations, he is asked about a story that he sang a Celtic song that day on the bus and laughs at the mere thought of it. “I’m not that brave,” he says with a grin.

The initial decision to move to Linfield in early 1994 did seem courageous but Fenlon says events on and off the pitch had prompted a need for change that overrode any concerns regarding the Troubles.

“A couple of things had happened,” he says. “My dad had died and I felt I wanted something a little different to do, a new challenge. And going to play for Linfield was a big challenge on and off the pitch. That got me going again from a football point of view and that’s probably why I did it in the end. Financially it was a good move as well.”

His first Setanta Cup encounter with them a few years back didn’t generate the same warm memories as Linfield came to Tolka and comfortably beat Shelbourne in the competition’s first final with Thompson one of the stars of the show.

Fenlon himself was there despite being sick that day while his players seemed to suffer a collective loss of appetite against a Linfield side that looked to take the game to their hosts from the opening minute. “I don’t think we underestimated them as a staff,” he says, “but I think that maybe the players thought that they should be able to beat a Northern team.”

Needless to say, it didn’t quite work out that way but many might believe the same effectively holds true today despite all the setbacks the southern game has suffered over the past couple of seasons.

The Bohemians boss reckons Linfield are something of an exception, though, and anyway, he argues, “none of that matters, we’ll only beat them if we play well enough to beat them on the day.”

Fenlon is hampered today with Steven Gray, Gareth McGlynn and Ruaidhri cup-tied and doubts about the fitness of Killian Brennan (ankle) or Anto Murphy (shoulder) while the wider occasion is unlikely to benefit much from an early kick-off that puts it up against television coverage of Manchester United v Chelsea.

Both teams also have big league games early next week with Linfield’s match against Glentoran providing the opportunity to all but wrap up a 49th league title.

However coach David Jeffrey, like Fenlon, possesses a depth to his squad that is the envy of his rivals and the visit to the League of Ireland champions of a team that, while it mightn’t have the tightest defence, can generate goals from just about anywhere – as the efforts of central midfielder Philip Lowry, right back Jim Ervin and, of course, Thompson all underline – pretty much always promises to be a somewhat special occasion.