St Patrick's seek early advance

St Patrick's Athletic will look to close in on a place in the Setanta Sports Cup semi-finals when they travel north to Dungannon for tonight's televised game (kick-off 8.05pm).

The Dublin side has managed four straight wins since the start of the season but the hectic schedule has started to take its toll with on the squad with Gary O'Neill and Joseph Ndo both likely to miss the game because of back and groin problems respectively.

Manager John McDonnell is satisfied with the options available to him with Mark Rooney, Michael Foley and Eamon Lynch all coming into the reckoning to start.

"We're optimistic that we can qualify from the group and it's important that we win this because the sooner we can do it the sooner we can start giving some of the others lads in the squad some games," says McDonnell.

"There are no under-21 games at the moment and so it would be useful to use the Setanta games for getting some of the lads some competitive football."

Drogheda United visit Glentoran for the night's other game (kick-off 7.45) but manager Paul Doolin may be without Stuart Byrne and Declan O'Brien, both of whom missed training yesterday with ankle problems.

"Shane Barrett and Stephen Gray are still out too while James Keddy and Jason Gavin have minor problems, although, to be fair," says Doolin, "we have cover in every area really so we're not going to start moaning."