THIS Saturday, the Larne first team squad travel to Poland for this year’s pre-season training camp.
After last year’s successful trip to Andorra, Tiernan Lynch and his men fly to Gdansk for an extended camp at the fantastic Hotel Mistral Sport close to the North coast of Poland.
The resort was used by the Spanish national team for Euro 2012, and is a popular with many high profile professional football team.
The players fly out on Saturday morning, and arrive at the resort at lunchtime before being put through their paces in two training sessions. Indeed, the players face a gruelling week, with double and triple sessions each day and will return back home early on Saturday 13 July.
Last summer, Larne drew 0-0 with Spanish Segunda Division side Gimnastic de Tarragona. This summer the Inver Reds will play in two friendly matches during the course of the week.
On Tuesday 9 July (kick off TBC), Larne will play German outfit, Chemnitzer FC. The East German side will be well used to winning football matches as the currentRegionalliga Nordost (German fourth tier) Champions, and will mix it with well known German sides such as Kaiserslautern, 1860 Munich and Hansa Rostock in 3 Liga next season. Die Himmelblauen have also been drawn to play Hamburg at home in the DFB Pokal in August.
The trip culminates with a friendly against the local Polish top flight side, Arka Gdynia on Friday 12 July, again kick off to be confirmed. Last season, Arka avoided relegation after finishing second bottom before the split in the Ekstraklasa, recovering to finish 13th out of 16 after the split. Their manager, Jacek Zielinski took over in April and is embarking upon his first full season with the club. Arka Gdynia won the Polish Cup as recently as 2017 and won back to back Polish Super Cups in 2017 and 2018.
There will be full coverage of the training camp and friendly matches across our social media channels throughout the week as the players work to build the foundations of the club’s first season back in the top flight.
