Paul Fennessy reports from Tallaght Stadium
SHAMROCK ROVERS BOSS Stephen Bradley was full of praise for Graham Burke after the attacker scored four goals, as his side hammered Derry City 6-1 at Tallaght Stadium on Friday night.
The former Aston Villa youngster, who also played senior football with Notts County before moving back to Ireland with Rovers, previously hit a 30-yard cracker in his team’s similarly emphatic 6-0 defeat of Bray Wanderers.
Burke’s current tally of five — already emulating his overall number of goals for the 2017 campaign — means the Dubliner is currently the Premier Division’s top scorer, one ahead of Cork City striker Graham Cummins.
“He was excellent,” Bradley said. “To be honest, I’ve seen him play better in terms of his all-round game. I’m delighted he’s adding goals because sometimes last year, he was brilliant the other way in terms of creating, doing everything, but not scoring.
“But tonight, he goes and gets himself four goals, he scores last week, I’m delighted he’s added goals to his game.”
Now 24, Burke previously showed considerable promise over the course of last season, but injuries and suspensions limited his game time and offset the more positive aspects of his play.
“Graham can do anything he wants to do,” added Bradley. “The problem last year with Graham was when he came on, he got sent off. And we needed to sit down and talk about that.
It was ridiculous the amount of games he missed for us, big games at the end of the season. I know he got injured, but there were suspensions in there.
“Once we showed him [the stats], he couldn’t believe it. Now you see him when he’s going into tackles, he’s looking after himself, he’s not being stupid hanging a leg in there or an arm.
“We just need to keep him on the pitch and he has the ability to do what he’s done tonight.
“Graham is the type of the player that, if you have him on the pitch and it’s 0-0 in the 90th minute, you have a chance of winning the game.
“He just gives you that creativity, he sees the game quicker than a lot of people. He’s just so clever around the box.”
Burke was not the only impressive Rovers attacker on show. Sean Kavanagh, who looked set to sign for Derry from Fulham until the Dublin side came in for him at the eleventh hour, produced an influential display and managed to register a goal to boot.
Candystripes boss Kenny Shiels, after it looked like he was set to sign him, described Kavanagh as “the best left-back in the league,” but the 24-year-old former Belvedere youngster played on the wing on Friday, with most of his standout moments coming in the attacking end of the pitch.
“I’ve seen Sean play a number of positions over the last few years, both for Ireland and Fulham, so I knew he was comfortable where he was. I didn’t realise how good he was in the higher part of the pitch, he can play left back, left wing, right wing, centre midfield, he can even play sitting midfield. Again, he’s similar to Graham, he can play, because he knows the game.”
Last night’s victory leaves Shamrock Rovers fourth, just two points off leaders Cork City, who were beaten 1-0 by Dundalk at Oriel Park in the evening’s other big game.
And Bradley is expecting it to be a very open Premier Division this year, with all the teams at the top capable of taking points off one another.
I don’t expect anyone to go on mad unbeaten runs like last year. The way it’s set up and the way we’re playing Friday and Monday, everyone’s going to drop points, it’s going to be a lot closer and I think Dundalk have shown that tonight by going and beating Cork.”
All of which sets things up nicely for Monday’s game, when Rovers, with their formidable array of attacking talent, will be looking to heap more misery on the Leesiders at Turner’s Cross.
