Lindsay hoping for home comforts against Turkey

Northern Ireland’s interim boss Kris Lindsay said he is relishing a return to Mourneview Park for his side’s World Cup qualifier against Turkey on Saturday.

Lindsay spent six seasons as a player at Mourneview with Glenavon and also served as a first-team coach at the club after he retired.

The 42-year-old hopes to savour the occasion and refused to be drawn into questions about his future after Saturday’s game when his interim reign is set to end.

“I’m relatively local to here and spent a lot of my career here, so I’m well at home and looking forward to leading the team out here,” he told BBC Sport NI.

“My full focus has been on Switzerland and Turkey, I’ve not thought further ahead than that.

“I have a lot of work to do for these two games. Whatever happens after that, happens.”

Northern Ireland lost their opening game of the qualifying campaign 2-0 against top seeds Switzerland, while Turkey eased to a 3-0 home win over Malta to extend their unbeaten run to six games.

Lindsay was pleased with aspects of NI’s performance against the Swiss, but is hoping for more attacking quality at home against Turkey.

“I thought our girls acquitted themselves really well, I was pleased with their out of possession work and yes, we didn’t have that much possession, but we limited Switzerland to very few chances and we stayed in the game until that second goal and we take huge positives from that,” he explained.

“We have work to do in our in possession, but Rome wasn’t built in a day and we’ll keep working on that and show what we can do on the ball.

“We want to be positive, go and attack teams and hopefully we can show that on Saturday and get the first points on the board.”

Winger Lauren Wade, who scored in a 2-1 defeat to Portugal the last time NI played at Mourneview, added that the game is “massive” for their hopes of securing a play-off even at this early stage of the campaign.

“It’s a big game for us and one we want to get three points in, being second in the group is where we want to be and that means this game is massive,” she continued.

“We know the threats they pose but we’ve worked on that and we’re ready for them.

“Kris has been great since coming in we have worked with him previously and that was great as well, he has given us belief and confidence to go and win the game.”