ANOTHER piece in Brian Carey's plans for next season slotted into place with announcement of a pre-season trip to Northern Ireland, the third straight year the club will have visited Ulster to prepare for the upcoming campaign.

The team will once again be based at the Slieve Donard Hotel in Newcastle on the County Down coast line, close to the border with the Republic, and of which famous writer Percy French was once quoted as saying, "Where the Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea".

Having undergone a recent major £15 million development, extension and refurbishment programme, this superbly maintained Victorian hotel is now home to one of Europe's finest resort Spas.

The town of Newcastle is on the doorstep of the hotel and the training grounds we will be using are at the opposite end of the beach, which makes for a good warm up for the players as they jog passed the local holidaymakers.

As part of the week we will be playing two friendlies and they will follow the same pattern as last year, with a match against Intertoto Cup entrants Cliftonville at the local Tollymore United ground on Wednesday 25 July (7.30) and then a visit to UEFA Cup entrants Dungannon Swifts on Saturday 28 July (3.00).

Cliftonville ended the league campaign in third spot, while also claiming the County Antrim Shield and Dungannon only just missed out on lifting the Irish Cup after losing to Linfield on penalties in the final

The team will head home following our trip to Strangmore Park.

Both fixtures proved to be good games last season, in particular with a large number of Cliftonville fans travelling across from Belfast. As their website states: "This was a very successful occasion last year and the club is delighted to be involved again."

This now brings to seven the number of friendlies already agreed for the coming weeks.

The players report back for training on Monday 25 June, although this will be only a short week with sessions on the Monday, Wednesday and Friday. This is to ease the lads into the routine ahead of their full-time work, which will follow from 2 July.