CORK CITY BOSS John Caulfield believes new recruit Graham Cummins can fill the void left by Seán Maguire on his return to Leeside from St Johnstone.
The Cork-born striker scored the goal which propelled the reigning champions back into the Airtricity League Premier Division in 2011, but departed for Preston North End – Maguire’s current club – ahead of City’s return to the big time just three months later.
Cummins’ final goal for his most recent employers, St Johnstone, arrived last month during the Perth club’s first Scottish league victory over Rangers at Ibrox since 1971, and Caulfield is adamant he’ll continue his goalscoring form as City begin the defence of their title in a month’s time.
“I think the main thing is that we were actively pursuing – for a long, long time – to get the right fit,” he said at today’s pre-season press conference.
“And, you know, the fact that Graham knows the club, he’s from here, and he has a history with the club – particularly when he was in the First Division and got so many goals – it was just a case that he’s at a great age, 30, and he’s been across-channel for a number of years so he’s got massive experience.
I think there was no doubt in Graham’s head when we met and we were going through things – there was no doubt in his head that he was coming back to Turner’s Cross to be a hero, and scoring goals every week.
“From my point of view, that’s what we need, because as we saw last year, if you’ve a guy who’s going to get you 15 or 20 goals in the league you’re going to be there or thereabouts.
“I think for both parties it’s a great signing.”
Caulfield has added eight new signings to the squad which won the Rebel county’s first double since 1951 last term, losing just three regular matchday squad players in Greg Bolger (Shamrock Rovers), Achille Campion (Linfield) and Stephen Dooley (Coleraine).
With the seemingly unstoppable momentum of last season having been halted halfway through due to the loss of goalscoring talisman Seánie Maguire as well as left-back and dead-ball specialist Kevin O’Connor to Preston, Caulfield is confident that keeping the nucleus of his starting XI intact will stand his troops in good stead next month.
The arrivals of potential stars such as Cummins and centre-back Aaron Barry will keep the champions’ old guard on their toes, too, according to their manager.
“I suppose in the bigger picture for us, we’ve kept the majority of our team.
“A lot of the new players that have come in have a huge hunger to win trophies – and when I met them all, that’s what they wanted: to win trophies. And that’s what we want.
“So fellas can kick on. And in training in the last couple of weeks, though it’s still early days, you can see great spirit and buzz in the training: new players coming into a group that have won a few trophies lift that group as well, and they show that they’re coming in to take places.
“That competitive spirit or attitude within the group – you need that.
There will be a little bit of settling in, to be fair, for some players, but I think in the bigger picture, I wouldn’t expect us to be settling in for too long.
