Mission to launch

The 2018/19 Danske Bank Premiership season was officially launched at Windsor Park this evening.

Cliftonville commence their campaign in Saturday’s eagerly-anticipated showdown with Glentoran, when Barry Gray takes his side to The Oval, and all 12 top-flight Clubs joined forces tonight to crank-up the countdown to the big opening weekend – which the boss himself is looking forward to.

“We’ve had a good pre-season campaign but, since our European matches ended, the focus has been on the opening day of the Premiership,” says Gray.

“Preparations for the game against Glentoran have gone well so far and we’ll be back in for another session to finalise things for the big kick-off. We’re looking forward to the game and the season in general and hopefully we’ve plenty of positives in store.”

NI Football League Managing Director Andrew Johnston is excited by what promises to be another intriguing year of action, commenting: “We’re all set to go with another exciting campaign this weekend! Crusaders and Coleraine took us to the wire last year, but we expect the Danske Bank Premiership to be more competitive than ever this year with all clubs strengthening over the summer.

“The support from Danske Bank has been invaluable to Irish League football over the past six seasons, we have focused supporting our clubs grow off the pitch as well as on the pitch and that is starting to show as a result of this partnership.”

Stephen Matchett, Chief Financial Officer at Danske Bank said: “It’s a pleasure for us to be back here at the National Stadium for the launch of the 2018/2019 Danske Bank Premiership season, our seventh season as title sponsors. Our partnership with the Northern Ireland Football League in both the Men’s and Women’s Premierships supports our ambition to make more possible for people and communities throughout Northern Ireland. We’re looking forward to another exciting season.”