After a short, enforced break due to the Northern Ireland Covid restrictions the Danske Bank Premiership returns today with a full set of fixtures.
Here is a reminder of how the league table currently looks going into today’s games: –
| POS | TEAM | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | PTS |
| 1 | Larne | 10 | 8 | 2 | 0 | 18 | 5 | 13 | 26 |
| 2 | Linfield | 11 | 8 | 1 | 2 | 27 | 13 | 14 | 25 |
| 3 | Crusaders | 10 | 7 | 0 | 3 | 20 | 9 | 11 | 21 |
| 4 | Ballymena United | 11 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 18 | 13 | 5 | 17 |
| 5 | Cliftonville | 11 | 4 | 1 | 6 | 14 | 13 | 1 | 13 |
| 6 | Glenavon | 10 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 16 | 16 | 0 | 13 |
| 7 | Coleraine | 10 | 4 | 1 | 5 | 13 | 14 | -1 | 13 |
| 8 | Warrenpoint Town | 11 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 11 | 14 | -3 | 12 |
| 9 | Glentoran | 10 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 17 | 11 | 6 | 11 |
| 10 | Portadown | 9 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 10 | 22 | -12 | 8 |
| 11 | Dungannon Swifts | 11 | 2 | 2 | 7 | 7 | 26 | -19 | 8 |
| 12 | Carrick Rangers | 8 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 7 | 22 | -15 | 4 |
The game of the weekend takes place at Inver Park today were the two form teams come up against each other in the shape of Larne and Ballymena. Tiernan Lynch’s league leaders remain the only side unbeaten in the top flight this season while David Jeffrey’s side have recovered from a slow start to climb up to 4th place.
It will be interesting to see how the short break has affected both teams as no doubt both will have wanted to keep their good runs of form going.
In the evening kick off Glentoran host Portadown at The Oval in a game being shown on the BBC Sport NI website.
The Glens are now unbeaten in three games and have managed to climb away from the bottom end of the table whereas their opponents today have only one win from their last five games and only goal difference keeps them out of the relegation/promotion play-off spot.
Elsewhere, Oran Kearney’s Coleraine side will be hoping to make it three wins on the spin and perhaps climb into the top six. They take on Carrick Rangers at The Coleraine Showgrounds, Carrick occupy bottom spot and are four points adrift of safety so need points on the board and soon.
Here is the full fixture list for today, all games kick off at 15:00 unless otherwise stated: –
Coleraine v Carrick Rangers
Crusaders v Warrenpoint Town
Dungannon Swifts v Cliftonville
Glenavon v Linfield
Larne v Ballymena United
Glentoran v Portadown (Saturday 2nd January at 17:30 – BBC Sport NI website)
With the league returning so does our writer’s prediction league, currently led by Rodney, and as usual the team will get a point for each correct outcome they predict and three points if they predict the result correct. Cameron is first up this week.
Cameron
Coleraine 2-0 Carrick Rangers
Crusaders 4-2 Warrenpoint Town
Dungannon Swifts 1-2 Cliftonville
Glenavon 0-3 Linfield
Larne 3-1 Ballymena United
Glentoran 2-1 Portadown
Rodney
Coleraine 3-0 Carrick Rangers
Crusaders 3-1 Warrenpoint Town
Dungannon Swifts 2-2 Cliftonville
Glenavon 1-3 Linfield
Larne 2-0 Ballymena United
Glentoran 3-1 Portadown
Darren
Coleraine 1-0 Carrick Rangers
Crusaders 3-0 Warrenpoint Town
Dungannon Swifts 1-2 Cliftonville
Glenavon 0-1 Linfield
Larne 3-1 Ballymena United
Glentoran 4-0 Portadown
Keith
Coleraine 0-0 Carrick Rangers
Crusaders 1-1 Warrenpoint Town
Dungannon Swifts 0-2 Cliftonville
Glenavon 1-4 Linfield
Larne 3-0 Ballymena United
Glentoran 1-1 Portadown
Adrian
Coleraine 3-0 Carrick Rangers
Crusaders 3-1 Warrenpoint Town
Dungannon Swifts 0-2 Cliftonville
Glenavon 1-1 Linfield
Larne 3-1 Ballymena United
Glentoran 2-0 Portadown
Here is the full leaderboard for our prediction league: –
| 1. Rodney | 43 |
| 2. Cameron | 36 |
| 3. Richard | 32 |
| 4. Adrian | 30 |
| 5. Keith | 28 |
| 6. Darren | 24 |
