All worked up

Hard work off the ball and quality on it was what Paddy McLaughlin asked of Cliftonville in last night’s Danske Bank Premiership tie with Glentoran.

The Reds emerged from The Oval with full points courtesy of Rory Hale’s finish in the opening minutes of the second-half, leaving the Manager singing the praises of the team’s application.

“A fantastic win,” was how McLaughlin described the night.

“It’s a difficult place to come. Glentoran are a lot of people’s favourites to win the League, so to come to their ground on a Tuesday night whenever a lot of our boys are coming off the back of Friday night’s tough game and work before the game, what a performance and what a result.

“It’s only three points. It’s no bigger than beating Warrenpoint two weeks ago or beating Carrick the week before, it’s another three points that were hard-earned and well deserved.

“We knew it was going to be difficult and there were going to be periods of the game where we’d have to do a lot of hard work off the ball and we were prepared for it, the players carried that out brilliantly.

“In the first-half, I don’t remember too many scary moments for Luke McNicholas and we said to the boys that, in the second-half, we just needed that wee bit of composure and wee bit of class in the top end of the pitch. If we kept working hard off the ball, put our foot on it whenever we won it back and show that wee bit of quality we have, there’s a chance we could score a winner from it.

“The boys then went and emptied the tank and defended heroically. They did everything that you’d ask of them, so it was a superb performance to a man.”

The only downside to the occasion from a Cliftonville perspective was the withdrawal of Jonny Addis shortly after the goal, but McLaughlin explained that his substitution was a precautionary measure.

“His hamstring was a wee bit tight at half-time,” he added.

“I told him if it got any worse in the next 10 or 15 minutes, we were going to take him out. I don’t think it actually got any worse but it definitely didn’t get any better and there was no sense in him running it off so we decided to take him out.”