‘Derby game’s 10,000 sell-out in Tallaght cannot be a one-off’ – Shamrock Rovers boss Stephen Bradley
Manager Stephen Bradley during a Shamrock Rovers media conference at the club's Roadstone facility. Photo by David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile
Stephen Bradley has warned that Friday night’s Dublin derby between Shamrock Rovers and Bohemians, likely to be an historic 10,000 sell-out, cannot be a one-off occasion.
A crowd of just 3,000 was on hand for the first Rovers-Bohs game in the new Tallaght Stadium in 2009 but with the addition this season of a fourth stand and intense public interest in the game, an attendance of over 10,000 is expected, as former Hoop Alan Reynolds takes charge of Bohs for the first time.
"It’s going to be really nice walking out and seeing Tallaght Stadium with all four sides sold out. It’s the best pitch in the country, bar none, and the best domestic stadium and now we’re going to showcase it. I’m really looking forward to it,” Bradley said.
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“It's something we have worked towards for quite some time, when we came in the average attendance was 1,200 or 1,300, maybe less.
“We have built it as a club up to a place where the average is really good, now we have the stadium, it will be brilliant to see it sold out, for everyone involved in the league,
"It shows where we can go, if you have the right facilities but it's up to us now as a club and the league as a whole, when the facilities are provided, to build on that and make sure it's not a one-off, make sure we have this regularly and that's our aim.
“It will be nice to see it on Friday but it can't be once or twice a season, it has to be on a regular basis and I firmly believe we can do that,” said Bradley.
The Rovers boss, who was on the FAI’s long list of candidates for the senior international team manager’s position, believes that the FAI should take note of comments made by Ireland captain Seamus Coleman in support of John O’Shea’s time as caretaker being extended into a long-term arrangement.
“I don’t know the players personally. It’s a hard one to answer when you don’t know the group. But you can just take them at face value, what they’re saying,” Bradley said of Coleman’s public support of O’Shea being in a candidate at least.
“When someone like Séamus Coleman is speaking who has been an incredible leader and captain for this country and one of the best right-backs in England for the last ten years.
“When he speaks I think you listen, he’s earned that respect in that dressing room but in football in general.
“Everything you hear about him is that he’s a proper man, a leader, so I think when he speaks you’ve got to listen and take that at face value.”
