CLIFTONVILLE boss Jim Magilton has heaped praise on Portadown manager Niall Currie for the start his side have made to life back in the Premiership.

Since gaining promotion at the end of last season, the Ports have settled back into the Premiership with ease and sit just three points behind Cliftonville in the table ahead of Saturday afternoon’s clash at Shamrock Park (3pm kick-off).

Magilton has twice faced Currie’s Portadown with a hard fought 2-0 win in the Irish Cup quarter-final last season, whilst Ryan Curran’s goal was enough to secure an opening day win at Solitude back in August.

He acknowledges that  Shamrock Park will be an extremely hard venue to get a result, but is determined to keep the pressure on Linfield at the top of the table.

“Niall has done a great job with Portadown,” Magilton acknowledged.

“He is an experienced manager; he knows the league and is obviously well connected with Portadown and Portadown is very well connected with Niall - it is his boyhood club. 

“There is a lot of feeling towards that and he is going to do his very, very best.

“He has recruited very good players, which helps of course, and those players have settled quickly into Niall’s ideas and how he wants his team to play and setup. They are an attacking threat and a team with outstanding individuals.

“It was a difficult place to go in the Irish Cup last year and we had to work extremely hard to get a result, as we did in the first game of the season.

“Niall will be looking at the opportunity to continue in a rich vein of form as we will be looking and keep pressing and trying to get results.”

Magilton admits that the Ports possess a lot of strengths, but is adamant that his players can approach the game with confidence.

“It’s not easy coming from the Championship because the gulf is large,” he said.

“Again, given his experience and knowledge of the league, you always felt that Portadown were going to be in safe hands and as I his recruitment has been very good, and the results have followed.

“We acknowledge that they have lots of strengths but we’re going to go there with great confidence.

“I’m very much looking forward to the game and the players are looking forward to the game. It’s a very busy period of the year for everybody and our focus and attention is trying to get three points.”

Admitting that the late cancellation of their weekend’s game with Carrick Rangers was less than ideal, Magilton revealed they made they were able to fill in the gaps on the training pitch.

“We want continuity and want momentum and it’s important to build,” he stressed.

“We had a great result midweek and were going in with great confidence but obviously we can’t legislate for bad weather and Storm Darragh - these things come along.

“We filled in the gaps, but we’d have much preferred a game as Carrick would have much preferred a game as well, building on their previous results. It gives us a full training week going into Portadown and we’re looking forward to that.”

Jonny Addis will return to contention following his suspension for the League Cup quarter-final clash with Armagh City and Michael Newberry also returns after injury.

“He [Addis] is an important player for us, and we have Michael Newberry back,” Magilton confirmed.

“Odhran Casey has done great since his return and to get himself into the team. The more quality players we have, the stronger we are and it then makes team selection slightly more difficult. He is an important player in our setup and how we want to play.”