Linfield boss David Healy simply couldn’t hide his frustrations as his team were blown away by an impressive Cliftonville at Windsor Park on Saturday.

The former Northern Ireland international striker was sitting out the last of a three-match suspension, the legacy of his dismissal against Crusaders a few weeks back.

Perched in the upper deck of the South Stand, Healy, accompanied by the club’s head of recruitment, Willie McKeown, couldn’t believe his eyes – his boys were not only outfought, they were outclassed all over the park.

They did go in at half-time with an underserved lead, courtesy of a Matthew Fitzpatrick goal, and even though they were overrun after the restart, the Blues finally cracked nine minutes from time.

placeholder image — Cliftonville's Ryan Corrigan celebrates his late winner. (Photo by David Maginnis/Pacemaker Press)

A crafty triple substitution by Reds’ boss Jim Magilton, introducing Ruaidhri Donnelly, Ryan Curran and Ryan Corrigan, paid a handsome dividend.

When Taylor Steven whipped in a delicious delivery from the right, Donnelly got up above everyone else and Curran provided the finishing touch with the flick of his head.

Four minutes later, the Blues paid the ultimate price following some calamitous defending. Ronan Doherty’s right-wing corner was spilled by goalkeeper Chris Johns and Corrigan was first to react, bundling the ball home from six yards.

Little wonder Healy jumped off his seat, throwing his arms in the air in despair. By that stage, he knew his boys were a beaten side.

Once again, he was deprived the chance of fulfilling his media duties, leaving his trusty assistant Ross Oliver to try and explain why the Blues fell to their third home league defeat of the season.

“We are normally very strong at Windsor Park, but it’s just not happening at the minute,” he said. “It’s something we must address very quickly, otherwise it will just keep on happening.

“It’s up to us now to get our heads together as a group, management, players and staff to see how we can fix things.

“Football is a crazy game, it’s difficult to explain things at times. For whatever reason, we just didn’t get out of the blocks.

“When Cliftonville equalised, they had the momentum, it swung massively in their favour and, to be honest, they looked the team likely to go on and win the game.

“It was a poor day...a poor performance. Even when we scored in the first half, we never looked like building on that.

“Cliftonville deserved to win the game, we must accept that, take nothing away from them. It’s a defeat we must take on the chin, but it’s a sore one.”

Down the corridor in the visiting dressing room, the mood was entirely different.

“Some of the football we played was really good,” beamed Magilton. “To come to Windsor Park and play in the manner we did against a top-class side was fabulous.

“Once we scored, the momentum was with us, we deserved to win the game...I don’t think anyone would dispute that. You know what you are going to get when you come here, so we had to be well prepared.

“I thought from minute one to 93 our focus and our determination to get a result was first class.”

On his inspired decision to introduce three strikers late on, Magilton preferred to credit his number two, Gerard Lyttle, for the move.

He added: “We felt if we could get quality into the box we could cause Linfield problems. Before that, our football was good, but we just hadn’t that cutting edge.

“Gerard must take all the credit for the substitutions. He was in my ear constantly to get the boys on. He was spot on and he deserves a lot of credit for that.

“When they came on, they had to make an impact – and they did that. Ryan and Ruaidhri are quality players...we have a young star in Ryan Corrigan.

“The good thing was, when we equalised, we didn’t settle for that – we wanted to press for the winner and that really pleased me. The boys kept going and they duly got their rewards.”