Mick McDermott tips Navid Nasseri to be key player for Glentoran

The former Iran Under-20 star has notched two goals in his first three appearances for the Glens.

After scoring at Coleraine in the League Cup last week, Nasseri bagged another in the 3-2 win over Larne in the County Antrim Shield on Tuesday night.

And McDermott feels this is a sign of things to come from the former Gillingham man.

“Navid is a really talented player,” he said. “I’ve known about him for a long time and I was delighted when I found out he was available.

“He hasn’t played in a long time so we have put him in gradually over the last couple of games.

“The Larne game was his first 90+ minutes, but he will get better and better.

“He can play through the middle, he can play central, he can play wide left or right.

“He will help us from now until the end of the season.”

McDermott’s men take on Larne tonight in the second part of a double-header.

And he is expecting a reaction from Tiernan Lynch’s side at Inver Park.

“They will regroup I’m sure,” said McDermott.

“There will be a bit of pressure on them down there under the television cameras.

“They have had a bad run of results. Their performances have been good, just like ourselves, they should have got a few results.

“They are a talented team and they will be hurting after Tuesday night’s result.

“I’m looking forward to playing them again, they are a good, honest team, they know how to play football, and the staff have done a brilliant job down there.”

McDermott was delighted to see his side come out on top in the County Antrim Shield quarter-final.

He praised the efforst of his players as they reached the last four of the competition after extra time.

“I thought the performance was outstanding, apart from the first 15 or 20 minutes as they started really well,” said McDermott.

“They were lively, they moved the ball really quickly.

“It didn’t worry us as we knew what to expect from them. After that I thought we took control of the game, and we took real control in the second half.

“We put pressure on them and they weren’t comfortable with that. I was disappointed with the way we conceded a couple of goals, but Larne are a talented team. We created the three best chances in the first half, but typical of the last few weeks we didn’t put them away.

“It was nice to get the winner. Darren Murray, who I thought was outstanding, ran his heart out for the team and that’s the Darren Murray we want to see.”

Larne boss Lynch was disappointed to see his side lose the game after their efforts.

“I was hugely disappointed that we didn’t go on and win the game, but it’s another building block for us to try and continue,” he said.

“I thought we started really brightly and played some really good football at times.

“It took us a while to get going in the second half and they scored at the right time.

“We showed great character to come back into it again.”

The Inver Park side have injury concerns over Jeff Hughes and Johnny McMurray.

He said: “Jeff Hughes is a worry for us as he came on and then had to go off again leaving us with ten men. He tweaked his hamstring and we didn’t want to take a chance with him.

“Johnny is probably very unlikely to be available.”