Last chance for Newry City to claim home league win as they host Loughgall in final game of the season

The season has come full circle for Newry City and Loughgall, who opened and will now finish their campaign meeting at The Showgrounds.

Both sides were tipped to be in a relegation battle when they met on August 5th, but then newly-promoted Loughgall stunned Newry with a 3-0 victory – with all of the goals coming before half-time.

However, that result would set the tone for the rest of the season for both teams, as Newry were never able to pull themselves out of the relegation scrap and were confirmed as down last weekend, whilst Loughgall were the surprise package of the season and came much closer to achieving a European play-off spot than falling through the trap door.

With Newry down and Loughgall unable to reach Europe, there admittedly isn't a whole lot at stake on Saturday evening, but both sides will want to go out on something of a high, before looking ahead to the future.

For Newry, it's time to rebuild and the question becomes who will stay and who will go in the summer. City will want to keep a hold of their best performers Adam Salley and Barney McKeown, whilst it's figured that January signings Steven Ball, Fra McCaffrey, Conor Mitchell and Brandon Doyle are in it for the long haul under Barry Gray and Dermot McVeigh.

Newry have looked like a team who can't wait for the season to be over in recent weeks, and slumped to a demoralising 4-0 defeat away to Ballymena United last Saturday.

This is their last chance to pull off a victory at The Showgrounds – something they haven't done in the league this season – but they will have to do it without the services of McKeown and McCaffrey, who are suspended.