MANAGER'S VERDICT: Rodney McAree gives his view on Declan Dunne red card after Dungannon Swifts goalkeeper sent off 13 minutes into Ballymena United defeat
Dungannon Swifts fell to a 3-0 Premiership defeat against Ballymena United at Stangmore Park on Saturday – a fixture in which they were reduced to 10 men after only 13 minutes when goalkeeper Declan Dunne was shown a straight red card.
The Swifts shot-stopper was given his marching orders for a challenge on Calvin McCurry with referee Michael McKenna deeming Dunne to be the last man and denying a clear goalscoring opportunity as the Ballymena attacker tried to round the goalkeeper.
Goals from Patrick McEleney, Jordan McMullan and Success Edogun ultimately sealed victory for Jim Ervin’s side.
Here’s what Dungannon boss Rodney McAree had to say after the match:
THOUGHTS ON THE MATCH?
"It’s difficult when you go down to 10 men, but I think we invited the red card decision onto us in terms of how we started the game.
"We invited pressure onto ourselves, we didn’t put enough pressure on the ball and in the early stages of the game we weren’t close enough.
"Ballymena started the game well and you look at the goal – Patrick McEleney is able to take the ball off the goalkeeper, travel 10 or 15 yards before knocking a straight ball which we should defend better and make better decisions with.
"Unfortunately it puts us down to 10 men and makes it difficult, but I actually thought after the sending off and for the remainder of the first half we were probably the better side.
"We were brave on the ball, passed it well, have a great opportunity at the back post with Andrew Mitchell, Dylan King has a header as well and we’ve a few half chances...if we’d went in at 1-1 it wouldn’t have been unjust.
"We started the second half quite well and then concede probably a bad goal. I haven’t looked back at it yet but it was a great finish...it was a bad goal to concede when we were in the ascendancy and at 2-0 it becomes very difficult.”
ANY COMPLAINTS ABOUT THE RED CARD?
“Not really, no.
"The only thing I would say is Danny Wallace is getting around the back and he is the one that picks the ball up.
"I understand that Decky is caught in no man’s land and he has made the decision which has gave away a free-kick and the referee has reacted off that.
"When Danny is picking up the second ball off the incident then we maybe have to look at was he the last man or had we covering defenders?”
DOUBLE BLOW WITH BALLYMENA SCORING STRAIGHT AWAY
"It was a fantastic strike from McEleney and it makes it difficult, but I thought the sending off sparked us into a bit of life.
"I thought in the second half we played some great football, passed the ball really well and we got into good areas.
"Adam Glenny has a chance at the back post when it’s 2-0 and if that goes in then who knows. Caolan Marron and Dean Curry had headers too, so we had a few half chances.
"We have to take the positives out of it. Caolan Marron came on at half-time and got 45 minutes – that’s a huge positive.”
LOOKING FOR POSITIVE RESPONSE AGAIN?
"It has to be at this stage.
"We’ve put ourselves in a fantastic position. If anybody had said to you at the start of the season that with three games to go you’d have a chance of finishing in the top-six and a semi-final to look forward to, you’d obviously have taken it.
"We have to respond. We want to do well, we want to finish as high up the table as we can and we have to remain positive.
"We have a positive changing room. They are hurting at this moment in time but we will be ready to go again on Wednesday.”
TOP-SIX FATE STILL IN YOUR HANDS
"We’ve three games to go. It’s a case of us focusing on Cliftonville on Wednesday night and going again.
"After Cliftonville we have Portadown and if we don’t have enough points from those two games then we have to do it in the next one which is Linfield.”