Portadown have had a successful season despite missing Play-Offs, beams Niall Currie
While their European Play-off dream evaporated as Cliftonville claimed seventh spot in the Sports Direct Premiership thanks to a 4-1 win over Loughgall, Currie reflected on the progress that he believes had brought good times back to the club.
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Belfast Telegraph
7 minutes ago
- Belfast Telegraph
Irish League: Updates from tonight's five Premiership games as Gary Haveron's Larne take on Cliftonville
There's five games in the Sports Direct Premiership tonight including the clash between Cliftonville and Larne at Solitude, where Gary Haveron takes charge following Nathan Rooney's departure.
Scotsman
3 hours ago
- Scotsman
Bob MacIntyre bottle jibes are ridiculous - he's playing great golf and has so much to look forward to
Sign up to our Golf newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Of course, it will hurt. Bob MacIntyre, after all, had played brilliantly for three days to get himself in a winning position in the BMW Championship and ended up falling short on Sunday. It was by no means the end of the world that he lost out to Scottie Scheffler, the game's dominant force, and finishing runner-up in the $20 million FedEx Cup Play-Off event delivered some big boosts for the Oban man. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad For starters, he's broken into the top ten in the Official World Golf Ranking for the first time, having climbed from 16th to eighth, while he is heading into the PGA Tour's season-ending $40 million Tour Championship in Atlanta this week sitting ninth on the FedEx Cup points list. Bob MacIntyre pictured during the final round of the BMW Championship at Caves Valley Golf Club in Owings Mills, Maryland | Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images The 29-year-old also secured an automatic spot in Luke Donald's team for next month's Ryder Cup and has done so in style by finishing second on the points list behind Rory McIlroy. All of those will undoubtedly help ease the pain he'll be feeling, but, nonetheless, it was no surprise that he admitted straight after the closing circuit that he was 'p****d off' and wanted to 'go and smash up my golf clubs'. On the back of his two PGA Tour title triumphs last year, MacIntyre is now performing at a level where he feels he can win big tournaments and, of course, came close to landing the US Open at Oakmont earlier this year, finishing second on that occasion as well. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad After also finishing in the top ten in The Open at Royal Portrush, he admitted that a win before the end of the year was one of his top targets and, having spreadeagled the field following the first 54 holes, this was a golden opportunity. MacIntyre had handled playing with Scheffler in Saturday's third round extremely well and felt confident heading into the concluding circuit at Caves Valley Golf Club as he was paired with the double major winner this season once again. Even with a four-shot deficit, it was inevitable that Scheffler would be hard to beat and, after hitting some imperious iron shots from the get go, he effectively sealed his win with an absolutely ridiculous chip-in for a birdie-2 at the 17th. Bob MacIntyre has secured automatic qualification for the Ryder Cup for the second match in a row |What MacIntyre will be disappointed about, though, is the fact his bogey-bogey start set the tone for what was ultimately a grind after he'd been almost free-wheeling over the first three days on a tough track. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad His driving had been superb, wasting no time bending down to pick up the tee after the vast majority of his tee shots, while his putting performance had probably been the best all season. Too many fairways were missed on the last day, though, and it certainly didn't help his cause that a solitary birdie didn't arrive until the par-5 16th, where, incidentally, he wasn't far away from making an albatross. Yes, he was helped by Scheffler making two unexpected sloppy three-putts as his title hopes stayed alive a bit longer than might have been the case. But, at the same time, MacIntyre deserves some credit for not letting his round totally get away from him. MacIntyre did not implode The Bob of two or three years ago would probably have imploded after his start, but nowadays he can dig in when the going gets tough and that is something he can lean on going forward. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad In fairness - and rightly so - the majority of people have reacted positively to MacIntyre's latest strong performance at the highest level in the men's game, though, inevitably, the odd negative comment has been made on social media. It's the same old chestnut about the Scottish psyche and why some people believe it holds back our sportsmen and sportswomen, but, certainly in the case of MacIntyre, that is utter nonsense. He loves nothing more than rolling his sleeves up for a battle and it would be absolutely ridiculous for anyone to suggest that he didn't come out on top on this occasion because he bottled it. Make no mistake, no-one will be more disappointed than MacIntyre himself that he let a four-shot lead slip and ended up finishing two shots behind Scheffler, who, incidentally, signed for a 17th consecutive score in the 60s to secure a fifth win of the season. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad He'll learn from this experience, though, and please don't let it overshadow the fact he's now a world's top-ten player and can keep climbing those rankings over the next few years. Or let it overshadow that, on the back of being undefeated on his Ryder Cup debut in Rome two years ago, he will be heading into next month's contest as a key player in Luke Donald's team.
BBC News
9 hours ago
- BBC News
Currie wants Ports to make Shamrock Park a 'fortress'
Niall Currie has urged his Portadown players to make Shamrock Park a "fortress" as they prepare to host Ballymena United on Tuesday (19:45 BST).The Ports banked their first points of the new campaign with an impressive 4-1 win away to Dungannon Swifts with Eamon Fyfe and Joshua Ukek on target in the first half before a second half brace from Jordan Gibson sealed win followed an opening day home loss against Glentoran and Currie is keen of replicating last year's form at Shamrock Park when they lost in the league just four sat out the weekend as their game against Linfield was postponed, but the Portadown manager noted their opening win away to Glenavon and wary of the threat of Jim Ervin's side."We're delighted to get off the mark," he told BBC Sport NI following Saturday's win."Sometimes you look at the fixtures and wonder where the first points are going to come from, so this was really pleasing."Ballymena are up next, and they've started strongly with a win over Glenavon. It'll be another tough game, no question."But the key for us is Shamrock Park. Last year, we made it a difficult place for teams to come, and that's exactly what we want to do again. We want to create a fortress here, somewhere nobody wants to visit."
