Gavin Dykes highlights Newry desire to give Barry Gray "a lift" in manager's cancer fight

​A Newry City statement released leading up to Saturday’s visit to Glenavon highlighted news of Gray’s cancer treatment and call to take time out of football.

Gavin Dykes, a long-standing friend of Gray, stepped in to aid Newry alongside Dermot McVeigh and took time out of his post-match review of the 3-2 loss to Glenavon to reflect on the difficult situation.

"The players are devastated, they wanted to get a result for Barry in the circumstances,” said Dykes. "Unfortunately it wasn't to be.

"It's been very difficult, it's been very difficult for myself personally, I'm a really good friend of his. I wouldn't be here only I am a very good friend of his.

"He's a great character, football crazy...he was texting some of the staff during the game. He will recover and he will get better and our best thoughts are with him and his family.

"The best that we can do is to try and put in performances and to give him a lift. I'll talk to him on the way home and go and try to build for next week.”

Newry now trail Ballymena United by five points as the Premiership’s basement side entering the final four post-split fixtures.

Newry battled back to level on two occasions away at Mourneview Park as Adam Salley cancelled out James Doona’s opening goal before Barney McKeown made it 2-2 after a Gavin Hodgins finish. However, Stephen Teggart delivered the final goal in the final moments for a 3-2 home win.

"It was really, really disappointing,” said Dykes. "I thought we put an awful lot into it...we were very good, the best team in the second half and we conceded poor goals.

"We conceded a goal from a long ball, it was a good finish. The last one was terrible - to concede a goal from 35 yards, a free-kick. 'Mitch' (Conor Mitchell), in fairness, he's not happy about it, he'll just have to go and make up for it over the next few games.

"I thought we showed great heart, great desire and got back into it and at 2-2 I thought it would be us to probably go on and win it.

"It was disappointing but we've just got to get on with it. The conditions were the same for both sides.

"The talking point was the penalty kick that wasn’t given...it hurts us because it gets us back 1-1 going in at half-time.

"I'm disappointed for the players, I'm disappointed for the staff and for Dermot because they put a huge amount of work into preparing the team.

"We'll keep going, it's not a lost cause until it's all over so we'll keep at it. We've to play Ballymena, we've three other games as well...a lot of points to play for, there'll be swings and roundabouts. We can't control Ballymena or any other team, we can only control what we can.”

He added: "Dungannon next...there's no easy games in this league, we're at the bottom for a reason. We're not expecting miracles...but we asked them to put in a shift today and hopefully we can go and build on it."