Oran Kearney warns his Coleraine side to make smart game management decisions after Dungannon collapse as they play host to Linfield

The Bannsiders start the calendar month with a visit of Linfield to the Ballycastle Road this afternoon in the Sports Direct Premiership, as they will also compete in the SPFL Trust Trophy and North-West Cup over the next four weeks.

Kearney's men are licking their wounds after dropping two crucial points last weekend as they led 10-man Dungannon Swifts by two goals heading into stoppage time.

However, two defensive lapses cost them dear as the Swifts somehow banked an unlikely point as Matthew Lusty and Ethan McGee both pounced in stoppage time.

Speaking after the game at Stangmore Park, Kearney was scathing of his side’s decision making as they failed to see the game out.

He said: "We got our two goals and looked like seeing it out quite comfortably and you're just down into that wee bit of game management towards the end which hurt us badly.

"To me, and I said it to the players in there and it's how I feel on the side of the pitch, at 2-0 we had other opportunities.

"We had a possible penalty and we had other chances to maybe score a third goal.

"But the sharpener for me is, whenever they score their goal to go 2-1 and there's a couple of minutes left, to me it heightens your senses, it heightens everything and your guard goes back up again and you play out those last two or three minutes very smart.

"We did for parts of it but we still wanted to go and get a third goal and win 3-1 rather than just taking our 2-1 and getting out.

"We had a couple of opportunities to possibly head towards the corner flag, see the game out, keep the ball, win a corner, win a free-kick and do the ugly thing.

"Sadly, we made a few choices there in that minute or so where we've gone to try and get a third.

"It's in doing that that we give away the ball, give away a foul, they put the ball straight into the box and bang - you couldn't write it."

It's been a busy week for the club off the pitch as Friends of Coleraine members have agreed a seven-figure investment proposal from two London-based businessmen.

However, Kearney's attention is solely on the visit of the Blues who will look to bounce back from last weekend's 3-3 draw at home to Carrick Rangers.

"We've a few out at this time and hopefully we're starting to move towards getting a few of those back," he added.

"All teams will have that during the season, it's part and parcel of football.

"It gives people opportunities and people have to grab those opportunities.

"We’re not going to talk about the 90 minutes before Dungannon’s comeback apart from maybe our finishing at certain points because you really couldn't have asked much more from a performance point of view.

“But that will all be forgotten now because of the final two minutes of how we dealt with them and we will discuss that.”