Given their poor record away from home this season, Galway United will hope to take some solace from the fact they are visiting one of just two grounds they have taken the three points from in 2025 when they head to the northside of Dublin tonight to take on Bohemians (7.45pm).

Dalymount Park and The Showgrounds are the only away venues where United have emerged victorious so far this season, and last Friday’s defeat in Drogheda means the Tribesmen are now on a seven-game run without a win, dating back to a 2-1 win away to Sligo Rovers back on April 12.

Garry Buckley acknowledged as much after last Friday’s game when praising those United fans who regularly back the team on away days: “Hopefully we can put in a big performance that our away fans are due,” he said in reference to tonight’s game, “we haven’t given them one in the last couple weeks, so hopefully we can give them something,” he said.

Looking at recent results on the road, United couldn’t really pick a better ground in which to climb out of that slump: they have taken seven points from their last three visits to the Phibsboro venue, including a thrilling 2-0 win there back in March.

Moses Dyer scored both goals that day, the second of which is a serious contender for goal of the season, but with the Kiwi having taken flight from United, and the league, last month, his former club needs to find a new source for the goals that will push them back up the table.

“We have our eye on a few players,” United manager John Caulfield said after last Friday’s defeat in Drogheda, “but it’s hard because the problem is some of the lads come in and they haven’t played in a while.

“Aaron [Bolger], he came on for 20 minutes and did well, but he hasn’t played since the start of May and even though he’s been in training, you can’t go and miss the preseason for six weeks and come straight into games like this.

“Axel [Piesold] is a good player as well, he’s been with us 10 days and he will get better and Aaron will get better. That’s the plus side but you know the games are coming thick fast and that’s the situation for us,” he said of the two players who made their United debuts last week.

Both are midfielders, with Malcolm Shaw being the player brought in to replace Dyer up front, and Caulfield feels the striker was wrongly denied his first goal in a United jersey on Friday night.

“The goal was a perfectly good goal,” he said of Shaw’s fifth-minute effort that was ruled out for offside.

“You can see he’s a yard onside and you say it to the linesman, he said, ‘well, we’ll have a look at it’ and then after the game, they go, ‘oh, well, we might have got it wrong’, but we could have been 1-0 up in a game in which there were very few chances,” the disappointed United manager said.

He also highlighted the lack of a grip on midfield that his side had last Friday night, with the absence of Cian Byrne being painfully obvious. United will be reunited with their former player tonight as Byrne has returned to Bohemians after his loan spell finished at the end of June, though whether he plays or not is another thing – he was an unused sub for Bohs in their Dublin derby with St Patrick’s Athletic last Friday.

“The positives are that Axel came in and did well and Aaron came on and did well. They get on the ball and take responsibility and they’ll help us because we didn’t control midfield. We were giving the ball away too much and that was frustrating, we didn’t do enough bar the last 10 minutes.

“We got the two lads in and we’re trying to get maybe another player in because we need to get stronger and certainly, you know, with [Conor] McCormack out for another week and [Patrick] Hickey being out, and we’ve missed them,” he said, before turning his attention back to tonight’s game.

“Every game is a dog of a game and they [Bohs] are flying. They have a chance of winning the league and they signed the goalscorer from Drogheda last week.

“The financial strength, the league is turning into two different markets, you just have to keep battling and see if you can stay in that position in and around midtable and stay away from the bottom teams,” he said.

Pictured: Rob Slevin in action against Shelbourne a fortnight ago. Photo: Joe O’Shaughnessy.