Jim Magilton 'expected more' from Cliftonville in defeat to Dungannon Swifts and now feels Premiership title dream is 'gone'

​After a midweek home loss to Linfield ended their 14-game unbeaten run, Magilton’s men failed to bounce back as Thomas Maguire, Ben Gallagher and James Knowles netted for the Swifts to secure a 3-1 victory at Stangmore Park.

The lively Maguire opened the scoring in the ninth minute against his former club, heading home from Leo Alves’ corner, and after defending resolutely, the hosts then shot themselves in the foot as an error from 20-year-old goalkeeper Alex Henderson on Premiership debut allowed Chris Curran to nip in and bring Cliftonville level.

However, the Solitude outfit weren’t able to build on that slice of fortune as Gallagher finished off a blistering counter-attack in the 83rd minute and Knowles dealt the final blow in injury-time.

It marks Cliftonville’s first defeat against bottom-half opposition this season and the result could be costly with Larne, who eased past Glentoran on Friday night, still holding a game in hand as they aim to retain the Gibson Cup crown while Linfield are now five points ahead in second.

"Well, I think that’s gone now,” Magilton said on his side’s title hopes. “I think that’s well gone now and our focus turns to the Irish Cup.

"It’s a disappointing day to say the least...Dungannon were deserved winners.

"We gave them a start when defensively this season we’ve been so good...we’re now shipping goals and that’s not good.

"Our motivation around not conceding goals is keeping the ball and we gave the ball away cheaply, resulting in the second goal.

"It’s a hugely disappointing afternoon for us, especially after another disappointing night on Tuesday.

"We were expecting a kick back from that...the goal woke us up.

"We controlled things, created decent chances without creating anything clear cut and we were gifted a goal – I hope young Henderson recovers from that because he’s a great kid.

"We didn’t go again...we got into decent areas without capitalising on it and in the end we got picked off.”

Magilton, who was without talisman Rory Hale due to suspension and made five changes from their Blues setback, admitted he expected much more from his team in County Tyrone.

Cliftonville have scored a league-high 70 goals this term but failed to show their ruthless edge.

"I expected more and didn’t get it,” he added. “At the end of the day we have to reflect on this performance, but you can’t dwell on it for too long because we have a massive match against a side (Portadown) that don’t lose many cup games.

"I have absolutely no idea (what it’s down to) because there was no reason to overreact...we got beaten on Tuesday night and didn’t perform particularly well, but I expected a reaction today.

"It was an opportunity to stand up for ourselves and ultimately we didn’t.”