Barry Coffey on why coming to Cork City kept his career on track

AFTER impressing during his initial loan spell last season, Barry Coffey was happy to extend his stay with Cork City until the summer.

The Celtic loanee scored five goals for the club last season and has already been amongst the goals this campaign.

Coffey did have offers to go elsewhere but the 20-year-old believes that playing for City has improved him as a player and he is enjoying his football with the club.

“The reason for coming back was that; I had a good end to last season, I enjoyed my first spell with City, and I was enjoying my football.

“I know we didn’t get off to a great start last year, but definitely come the end of the season, we did very well and we built momentum going into this season,” Coffey said. “I could see that there was a vision for the club and there was a project in place. I have a good relationship with Healers [Colin Healy], and I just really enjoyed last year, so it ticked all the boxes to come back and kick on again.

“There were a couple of clubs around but I wanted to keep playing and get as much game time as I could.

“Coming here, and off the back of last season it felt right to keep progressing my career and keep going in the upwards direction, and it made sense to come back and get a lot more games under my belt here.

“I only realised, probably in the last eight months the importance of being happy playing football.

“You play your best football when you are enjoying it. It’s a hard sport on a good day, so when you are not enjoying it, it’s very difficult. But once you are enjoying it and playing well and you are playing week in week out, it does make it easier to perform on the pitch when you are in a good space off the field.

“To get the best from yourself and get the best performances, you do need to be enjoying playing football.

”I’m always trying to improve. I think every player has to want to get better. I suppose looking back last season, it was the first time really that I was playing week to week in a first-team environment.

“In my own head; my aim coming back was to improve and go a step better than I did last time, both individually and as a team.

“Every day, every session, every game, you can keep getting better so that is definitely the goal.

I think any player would be silly to think that they are the finished article and that they can’t improve, especially me since I am still at a young age.

“You would be silly to think that you have conquered one part of your game. I am always trying to improve in every aspect.

“I like getting in the box and scoring goals, but I also take part in getting clean sheets in games.

“Obviously, there is a big part of me that wants to get goals and be a threat in the final third but there is also a part of me that knows there is a defensive role to be done, so I want to improve defensively.”

HOOPS DREAM

Coffey’s parent club, Glasgow Celtic, were happy for their player to return to Leeside for a second spell.

The midfielder is on loan with City until the summer but the 20-year-old is not worried about what might happen in the future.

“I went back to Celtic after the season ended. I wanted to keep fit. I was training there.

They were happy with how it went here. It was a productive loan move. It brought me on. I got a lot of games under my belt.

“I got goals and assists. I believe I played consistently well over a period of time, which I hadn’t done really in my career.

“I hadn’t played that many games consistently. So, Celtic were happy, they understood the thought process of me coming back here. Things went well the first time, so it made sense for me to come back in.

“I’m not focused on what is going to happen in the summer.

“I’m focused on the now, and what I can only have an influence on at the present.

“It’s about getting off to a good start both for me and the club. We will just have to wait and see what happens come the summer then.”