Armagh aiming to capitalise on home comforts and put pressure on Buccaneers at top

The Ulster rivals meet again at the Palace Grounds and while Armagh coach Chris Parker was happy to leave Belfast with the four points last Saturday, he wants an improved performance from his team in the rematch.

“I thought we played very poorly and the boys admitted afterwards it wasn’t up to the standards they expect of themselves, but they showed a lot of belief at the end to get over the line and get a result when we probably didn’t deserve it,” Parker said.

“We were just delighted to come away with four points because it could have been less than that.

“We are pushing on and we are the right end of the table. The character was the big one on Saturday, a few things didn’t go right for us, the boys knuckled down and still managed to secure a result.

“We spoke afterwards that character can’t be taught, we coach them lots of things but you either have that in you or you don’t, luckily this group have a bit of character and fight in them in abundance.”

Parker has no issue with playing back-to-back games immediately after Christmas in a change from the norm, with games previously taking place before and after the festive break.

“I think it’s good and it adds a wee bit of spice to it and it is very different, it’s like the Champions League in football with the back-to-back thing,” he said.

“I suppose the two clubs will have prepared the same way and will know how exactly each other play or going to try to play.

“I guess it is [about] going out and trying to execute the plan we tried to do last week and we failed to do.

“Standards at training this week have been excellent and hopefully we can implement our plan a wee bit better than we did last week.”

Malone are bottom of the table and Parker is quietly confident his side will bag another four points at home.

“We always talk about winning our home games and after that anything you pick up on the road is a bonus,” he said.

“Our home form has been pretty good so we are hopeful if we can improve on where we were last week we can get four points again.

“The big work-on for us constantly is our discipline, we’re giving away 12 plus penalties every week and that is just giving the opposition the ball back or giving the opposition the ball 20/30 metres up the pitch, and we are having to defend to try and get it back again.”

“If we can be a bit more disciplined, we might get a bit more position and we might starve the opposition of opportunities to score.”

Shea O’Brien and Frank Bradshaw-Ryan are released by Ulster and Peter Lamb also returns to the starting line-up.

Malone have Ulster hooker Declan Moore available.

Banbridge, who are a point above Malone, travel to Old Wesley.

In the top flight Ballynahinch have Ulster forwards Cormac Izuchukwu and Marcus Rea available for the trip to UCD.