David Healy disappointment after Linfield 'found a way not to win' in first Premiership defeat of the season to Larne

Following a forgettable first-half where neither side created chances of note, Linfield were undoubtedly the more impressive after the break and kept visiting goalkeeper Rohan Ferguson busy – the Scottish shot-stopper forced into saves to deny Joel Cooper and two Euan East headers.

Four minutes after collecting the second of East’s efforts, Matty Lusty sparked a counter-attack which ultimately ended in Conor McKendry scoring the decisive goal as Larne picked up a first league win of the season and handed leaders Linfield their maiden loss.

Tiernan Lynch’s side have had the upper hand in the recent head-to-head between the Irish League’s two best teams – they’ve only lost one of their last 10 Premiership meetings against the Blues, winning four and drawing the remaining five – and Healy felt it was a missed opportunity for his team to extend an early points advantage.

"When you’re on top of the game you have to capitalise and we didn’t...balls coming in, couple of ricochets, someone being more alive in the box because there were opportunities for us to take the lead and I feel if we take the lead today we win the game,” he said. "It’s frustrating, disappointing – the goal we concede is really sloppy, indecisive giving the ball away in the box, indecisive because we think the ball is going out so we stop and we get done with a really poor goal.

"We had enough opportunities and had enough possession in the final-third and that’s where it’s key for your so-called better players to open the game up and we didn’t do that today. At worst for us it should have finished 0-0. It’s disappointing we didn’t go and extend the points difference over Larne so early in the season.”

With Larne’s European exploits, Linfield entered Saturday’s showdown sitting 12 points better off than the back-to-back champions and have now been joined at the summit by Cliftonville, who they’ll face at Solitude on Tuesday evening.

When asked if the magnitude of their weekend clash played into defeat, Healy added: "Honestly, no I don’t think so. For me, no because it’s so early into the season and it’s just another game.

"If this had have been 20 games in and everything evens itself out in the league campaign and you know where you are, but today was about us capitalising on where we are and we didn’t do that.

"There was no difference going into the game in terms of how we spoke or before or during the game...I was as intense today as we’ll be at Cliftonville on Tuesday and against Carrick next Saturday because six, seven or eight games in you don’t win titles – you jockey for getting in and around the top.”