Cliftonville v Portadown

I
THINK it would be fair to
say that nobody saw Tuesday
night’s performance
and result coming.
As disappointed as we were to
lose to such a late goal at Larne
last weekend, we were able to
take positives from the workrate
and intensity of our play
against such a strong team.
The plan was to carry that into
the Ballymena game and, if we
could also add in the creation of
a bit more in the final third, we
would set ourselves up to come
away with a win.
Unfortunately, none of that
happened.
Nothing that we had planned to
bring into the game was there
and it ended up being a comprehensive
win for Ballymena.
We’ve taken a lot of criticism
since then and rightly so and,
while the players’ confidence has
obviously taken a hit due to the
run we find ourselves on, we
have to snap out of it quickly.
It’s my job to get their heads up
and get them enjoying themselves
again. We seem to be
playing with a lot of burden on
our shoulders but whatever it
takes to get the best out of each
individual player - whether it be
an arm round the shoulder or a
kick up the backside - that’s
what we’ll do.
We can’t feel sorry for ourselves,
“
It’s only by rallying together as a group
that we can get back to the levels we want to
be at.
”
4
nor do we welcome pity from
outside. We have to work hard
and play our way out of things
ourselves. It’s only by rallying
together as a group that we can
get back to the levels we want to
be at.
We haven’t created enough opportunities
for our forward players
and when you don’t do that,
you’re always going to find
things difficult, so you can rest
assured that serious work will go
into that.
I know it’s been difficult for our
fans recently too because
nobody likes to see their
team keep getting beat. It’s a
harsh lesson for all of us at the
minute but I believe we can come
out of it stronger
and benefit from
those lessons in the
long run.
First and foremost,
we just have to
put an end to the
losing run - starting
today.
Our results over
the last few
weeks will have
Porta-
confi-
that
can
here
get
given
down
dence
they
come
and
something
and we must
be wary of
the threat
posed by
their young
squad but I
have faith
that we can
get the result
that will get
our season
back on
track.