David Healy reflects on pre-season friendly against Kilmarnock
Posted : 9th July 2023
Although Linfield manager David Healy consistently emphasises that his priority in friendly fixtures is the additional match fitness and avoidance of injuries for his players, he was pleased with the performance of his team in their 1-0 win over SPFL Premiership side Kilmarnock at Windsor Park on Saturday afternoon.
“In pre-season, you’re never going to get the perfect game, the perfect outcome and the perfect everything, but I thought we showed good performance levels today. I thought we controlled the majority of the game and missed three or four really good goalscoring opportunities. So yes, the performance was pleasing, but as I said last week after the match against St. Mirren – the most important thing is that we come through with a clean bill of health, which it looks as if we have done today.
“We had a couple missing; Jordan Stewart and Robbie McDaid are both out fairly long term. We had John Robertson missing with a minor injury, and we’re hopeful that Josh Archer’s injury will only be a short-term one also. Stephen Fallon missed out today through injury but he shouldn’t be out long-term either.”
Looking ahead, Linfield return to competitive action as they officially kick off the 2023-24 season with the first leg of the UEFA Conference League Q1 tie against Albanian team KF Vllaznia to take place at Windsor Park this coming Thursday, 13 July at 19:45, and the Blues’ boss says he’s been busy doing his homework on the opposition.
“We’ve had a good look at them. Their final domestic match last season was at the end of May, so when you look at it, you’re not playing a team from the likes of Norway who’d be mid-season and in such circumstances, you’d be up against it in terms of team sharpness and proper match practice. Similar to ourselves, they’ve moved on six or seven regular starters, so we’ve had to identify their new signings and see what way they’re going to play. If we need to change anything during the game or in between legs then we’ll do that, but I want to put an impetus on that it’s about us – how we approach the game and how we perform to our strengths.
“We know that it’s important to take some sort of advantage into the second leg in Albania, so my players and I would love a large Linfield support cheering us on at Windsor Park come Thursday evening.”
All the very best to our manager David Healy for what we all hope will be a good night at Windsor Park this Thursday to mark his 400th match in charge of the Blues.