St Patrick's v Cork City (7.35)

Cork travel to Dublin without Dave Hill who remains in England following the recent death of his brother, but Dave Barry should have the same squad to choose from as he had for the Finn Harps game on Sunday, with Patsy Freyne, Gerald Dobbs and Gareth Cronin all expected to shake off knocks in time to play.

The formation will be the same for this game as it was on Sunday, but there might be one or two changes in personnel, with John Caulfield leading the queue of would-be replacements.

St Patrick's, meanwhile, have just about everybody in contention for a starting place with Keith Doyle back from suspension and all the players carrying knocks over the early weeks of the season now fully recovered.

Doyle's availability appears to pose the greatest dilemma for manager Liam Buckley who must decide whether to drop Paul Campbell again. On the other side, Willie Burke is also pushing for a return, but Buckley admits to having been impressed by Trevor Crolly's performances of late and so, if anybody is about to lose out from last week, it is likely to be the man they call `Soupy'.

Buckley feels there is room for improvement but insists that they are moving steadily in the right direction. "I though last week was a lot better, but Cork will be tougher, they have a lot of team spirit which makes them hard to play against and we are going to have to step up another gear if we want to win this one."

Last season: Cork 0 St Patrick's 1, St Patrick's 3 Cork 3, Cork 1 St Patrick's 1.

Recent league form: St Patrick's: WLWWW; Cork: WWWWW.

Leading scorers: St Patrick's: Gilzean (five), Molloy (four); Cork: Cahill (five), Flanagan and Dobbs (three apiece).

Betting: Home: 11/8, Draw: 11/5, Away: 13/8.

Referee: H Byrne (Dublin).

Waterford v Dundalk (7.45)

Unhappy days for these two with Dundalk propping up the league and Waterford slipping back fast after a promising enough start to their campaign. With Tommy Lynch having been ousted Mike Flanagan takes the reins this evening but having only arrived a couple of days ago the Englishman is likely to be managing by committee during his first game at the RSC.

Things are not improved for the former Charlton coach by the fact that this evening will be the first time he sees some of his players.

The club's fans might wonder if Tommy Lynch didn't deserve slightly longer at the helm but now they will be anxious to see Flanagan help the side to a few wins in order to help them avoid a season long relegation battle.

That, for the moment at least, looks to be what Dundalk are in store for. Manager Jim McLaughlin knows he has to start turning the corner pretty quickly at Oriel Park but his cause hasn't been helped by the failure of Lawrence Davies, who he believed he had signed from Bradford, to materialise when the plane the striker was supposed to be on landed at Dublin this week.

The club expect to strengthen their squad next week but for the moment McLaughlin must content himself with the fact that Peter Withnell and Mick Doohan are back from injury and suspension respectively. David Hoey, however, is down with a viral infection and will miss out.

Last season: Did not play.

Recent league form: Waterford: DDLLL; Dundalk: LDDLL.

Leading scorers: Waterford: Dully (two); Dundalk: Withnell (three).

Betting: Home: 5/4, Draw: 9/4, Away: 7/4. Referee: A O'Regan (Cork).

Betting courtesy of Paddy Power