Chris Parker keen for City of Armagh to continue fine All-Ireland League away form

Chris Parker’s side lost on the opening day at Ballynahinch but have been perfect on the road since, beating Garryowen, Terenure and Young Munster.

Armagh, sitting eighth after a disappointing late defeat to Lansdowne last week, travel to third-placed Clontarf on Saturday and Parker is hoping his team can continue their impressive away form.

“I suppose it is a bit frustrating to be honest,” he said. “From previous years it seemed difficult to win on the road but this year on the road a lot of teams are picking up points.

“That notion of home advantage all the time has gone a bit because the league is so competitive.

"We’re travelling with a bit of an expectation to produce a performance and hopefully that performance can pick us up some points.

“It would be great if we could find the answer to why we can perform on the road but can’t do the job at home or finish the job at home.

“Hopefully it will give us another reason to think about it this weekend if we can produce another performance similar to what we have done in our previous away games.”

Parker felt Armagh were masters of their own downfall last weekend.

“Frustrating is the word,” he added. “We had done really well into that gale to turnaround points up at half-time and I suppose through a combination of discipline and our own individual errors we ended up throwing the game away.

"It is something that we have spoken about this week and learned from and hopefully on the road we can put that into practice this week.”

Clontarf are two points behind leaders St Mary’s with six wins and two defeats.

“They are a team that never goes away and they have a habit of winning and they showed that by going and winning at Ballymacarn last week against the league leaders,” said Parker. “It’s a huge ask but it was a huge ask to go to Terenure and win, it was a huge ask to go to Young Munster and win.

"We are going there with no pressure on us. If we pick up a victory great, if we don’t no one bats an eyelid.

“Pressure is off, it is the last game before the Christmas break in the All-Ireland League and we’ll go there and put our best foot forward.

“I think these back-to-back games are big ones every year.

"The far side of January it’s a bit like moving day in golf, they can really set you up or it can put you down at the wrong end, so we just need to keep picking up points.

“We were unfortunate last week. We felt we should have got a bit more – hopefully we can get a few more this weekend.”

Sam Glasgow and Paul Mullan are both missing so Phil Fletcher and James Crummie come into the squad.

Ballynahinch lost top spot last week and travel to fourth-placed Terenure. Bryn Ward and Rueben Crothers start in the back row while scrum half Conor McKee is released by Ulster.