Larne will look at themselves in the mirror, says Tiernan Lynch as Inver Reds return to Premiership duty this weekend
Larne manager Tiernan Lynch says the Inver Reds will be "looking in the mirror" after their Conference League defeat to Shamrock Rovers on Thursday night.
In a match that pitted the Irish League champions vs the League of the Ireland champions, it was the Dublin side who showed their quality to run out 4-1 victors at Windsor Park.
It marks a second group stage defeat for Larne in their maiden voyage into the main stage of European competition and Lynch said no excuses will be given by him or the players for the loss.
"I would love to sit here and look for excuses and all that kind of stuff," he stated.
"But tonight's (Thursday) game was lost in 20 minutes and it was lost on the things we didn't do.
"Set-pieces and the goals that we conceded in the first 20 minutes, starting with the first one after two minutes, the whole kind of game plan goes out the window in a sense.
"You have to change what you do and we struggled to recover from it.
"We've got to take it on the chin and we spoke about how we have to watch it back, look at this collectively as a group and look at the areas we fell short in.
"We've got to face them, work on them and we've got to try and put them right."
The game was billed as “champions vs champions” with a lot of media attention surrounding the fixture, but Lynch says his players didn’t buckle under the pressure.
However, he did admit that he would have loved the tie to be at Larne’s home ground of Inver Park as Rovers enjoyed the freedom of the large playing surface at the National Stadium – with Republic of Ireland international Graham Burke pulling the strings as he provided a goal and three assists.
Lynch commented: "I don't think tonight (Thursday) is a night for excuses.
"It’s a night for looking at yourself in the mirror - me included - I think that's what this has to be about.
"We can talk about not handling the occasion but...when you concede the goals that we conceded from second phases or set-pieces, men running off us or whatever it may be, I don't think the occasion has anything to do with it.
"I'm going to be searching and sound like I'm trying to make excuses, but the best way to answer this is would I have loved to have got them at Inver Park? Yes - but we didn't.
"There were certain things tonight that we were very naive and I also thought there were periods where we played good football and showed glimpses of what this team is about and what they're capable of.
"Unfortunately, the damage was done before we got ourselves back into the game."
Larne return to Premiership duty on Sunday as they face Portadown at Shamrock Park.
Lynch will be sweating on the fitness of full-back Tomas Cosgrove who limped-off late on Thursday with a suspected ligament injury.
"Tomas Cosgrove took a knock at the end. He left with his ankle in a boot, and in ice,” Lynch continued.
"It is too early to say how bad it is or how swollen it is.
"It could be ligaments, but we it is too early to know."