Oran Kearney hopes to see greater Ballymena United goal rewards in area 'we practice more than anything'

For just the second league match this season, Ballymena failed to find the net in last weekend’s home defeat to Bangor, who sat bottom of the Premiership prior to Ben Arthurs scoring a crucial winner at The Showgrounds.

According to Sofascore, the Sky Blues registered 13 shots on goal against Bangor, held 64% ball possession compared to the opposition’s 36% and had 10 corners, but weren’t ultimately able to find a breakthrough.

It also marked a third consecutive match across all competitions in which Ballymena conceded first – they came from behind to beat Crusaders and Newington, but couldn’t repeat their great escape feat last weekend.

Last month, Ballymena went 2-0 ahead against Limavady United before losing 3-2, despite having 23 shots and an expected goal (xG) value of over five.

While Kearney’s men have passed up a number of opportunities to better their Premiership position, the Ballymena chief insists his players have been working hard – and now wants them to deliver under match pressure.

"We probably seen it at Limavady as well where in the last 20 minutes of that match we created five or six great opportunities,” Kearney told the club’s media channel. “There seems to be this thing when you’re chasing games or behind that there’s a lack of calm or composure in the finish.

"Against Limavady we slashed three or four over the bar and we rushed things, Bangor was possibly similar where we had big opportunities.

"You want calm, you want to see shoulders dropping in those areas...if you can take one after 65 or 70 minutes, the game is set up and you can have a real grandstand finish.

"It’s the one part of the game we practice more than anything because it’s the hardest part of the game, that final third aspect with creating the cross and finish, all those things around that area.

"What you do see also is when you’re 2-0 or 3-0 up, it becomes easy and players can do it with their eyes closed, but the acid test is on days like (against Bangor) when you’re behind, can you go do that?

"We’ve gone behind and won games, but it’s not a habit you want to get into because sooner or later it bites you on the backside.”

Ballymena had an enforced 11-day break between games ahead of their Bangor clash after a postponement against Glentoran, but now face six before the end of November in three different competitions.

"The slight worry for me (going into Bangor) is you can overplay games and you’re going to get that with the way these fixtures are going to fall,” added Kearney. “We’re going to end up playing three or four Tuesday nights on the bounce, which isn’t ideal.

"The other side is you don’t want to underplay and missing the Glentoran game left us with an extended break...we worked really hard but you’re never sure how you’ll come off the back of it.

"We wanted that to be on...a little bit of frustration in that, but we can’t deal with the weather, those things are going to be there.”