Goalkeeper Bossin yet to return to Cork City

GOALKEEPER Liam Bossin has yet to return to training with Cork City due to Covid-19 measures but he remains with the club despite interest from his native Belgium.

City were back in training a fortnight ago and former Republic of Ireland U21 international goalkeeper Bossin came back to Ireland on July 1 but has had to remain in quarantine for 14 days.

The Belgian native was signed at the beginning of the season and played in the first four Premier Division games but suffered a concussion in the 1-0 win over Finn Harps and had to be replaced by Mark McNulty. McNulty started the next game, the loss at St Patrick’s Athletic, which proved to be City’s last before the lockdown.

There are clubs in Belgium keen on Bossin and if he does depart then McNulty will be challenged by David Harrington – son of Phil – for the starting spot.

City will also have loan players Joseph Olowu (Arsenal) and Deshane Dalling (Queens Park Rangers) in their squad for the remainder of the season. Centre-back Joe Redmond and right-back Kyron Stabana, who had been on loan from Birmingham City and Wimbledon respectively, won’t be back either but teenager Josh Honohan will made the step up to the first-team squad, having finished secondary school.

Fenn is also hopeful of additions from England, with two attackers and a defender targeted. According to City chairman Declan Carey, having funds for reinforcements was planned at the beginning of the campaign.

“At the end of the day, we’re in a sprint to the end of the season and to finish as high as we possibly can,” he says.

“A number of teams will be in a very similar position in terms of the strength of their squads and we feel that the club is in a stable enough position to sign players.

“We were very prudent in the winter, a lot more prudent than people might actually think – I know it was widely reported that we had slashed budgets but we were planning for a potential summer budget.

“I mentioned in an interview with The Echo that we’d have a summer budget for the first time in years and that’s something that we’ve been able to bring to fruition. We’ve had an influx of cash from the sale of the Seán Maguire and Kevin O’Connor clauses and that has helped us out considerably.

“Is any League of Ireland club ever a couple of games away from a crisis? Probably not, but we’re definitely a lot further away from a crisis than we were back in February.

“We’re in a solid place now and it’s great to be working with Neale on these types of things rather than the difficult conversations that we had to have previously.

“It’s exciting for us as a club and hopefully very exciting for fans.”