Josh Honohan is expected to do very well by Shamrock Rovers; Stephen Bradley, the winning manager, likened Cork’s capture to that of Liam Scales.
The 23-year-old was recruited by the five-time champions at a nominal five-figure cost from relegated City, and he has since flourished in a number of roles.
His stint as a left wing back continued with Friday’s decisive 3-1 victory over Bohemians in front of 10,094 fans at Tallaght Stadium, the largest in the league this century.
His efforts paid off when pundit and former Ireland defender Kenny Cunningham named him man-of-the-match.
Scales had a similar journey, coming from UCD as a left-sided defender and being pursued by Celtic in 2021 for a €600,000 signing bonus.
Since then, he has begun in the group stages of the Champions League and made his Ireland debut in the latter half of the Stephen Kenny era last year.
“I believe Josh has a really high ceiling,” Bradley remarked following their second straight victory.
“I had spent a year observing him. Whenever I watched one of his games, I assumed he was playing a different position. However, his level of comfort has caught me off guard.
“What I adore about Josh is that he seeks out as much information as possible from you when you work with him during the week, offering him tactical and technical support.
In the long run, I believe he will play centre back. He is built like a machine: he can play full back or wing back, is extremely quick, and has excellent ball control with both feet.
As soon as I signed him, I told him that I thought he had a Liam Scales mentality and that he could be asked to play in front of an audience and he would respond, “How do you want me to play it? No problem, I’ll do it.”
That character type is what he is. He still has so much more to give. If he can just make a small adjustment, Josh, I believe he can score ten goals for us.
As per their season, Rovers took a while to get going and it took Johnny Kenny’s deft finish three minutes after the restart for them to take the lead. For Alan Reynolds, the new Bohs manager, it was a hard initiation.
The Hoops are now fifth in the standings, but they are still 10 points behind Shelbourne, who set the early pace. On Monday, they travel to the RSC to play Waterford.
He gave his explanation for the slowness, saying, “We were hesitant in the first half – maybe it was the occasion in terms of everybody talking about the 10,000 being the biggest attendance.”
“We simply moved ten yards up the pitch in the second half, playing faster, running faster and being more aggressive. The spaces were there.”
“They could have been four or five by the end, to be honest, because they really hurt them then with those spaces and the penetration was much quicker.”
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