Bradley hails composure

COLERAINE striker Eoin Bradley admits it is great to be amongst the goals after netting in the derby win against Ballymena United…

The Glenullin man made it 20 career goals against the Sky Blues in fine style as his 74th minute wonder strike helped Coleraine record a 3-0 success.

The ex-Glenavon ace spoke about how big the occasion was for the club as they played on the synthetic surface for the first time in front of a bumper crowd on the Ballycastle Road.

“It was good to get back on the pitch and back scoring,” he said.

“That’s two in my last two games and we had a good draw last week and good win today .

“Things are looking up after the first two games and we showed a wee bit of composure there to keep things going.

“There was a big crowd here today, a big day for the club, and everything turned out well.

“For the goal, the ball was played up, think was maybe Glacks who played it on and I just volleyed it and thank God it went in.

“It was a good team performance from start to finish and with having the crowd back today, the place was buzzing.

“It was a massive day for the club and thank God we got the three points.”

The 37-year-old admitted he and his team-mates were a little bit ‘nervous’ heading into the contest but that was quickly solved as Matthew Shevlin and Cathair Friel also got on the scoresheet.

“Oran talked all week about us keeping our composure,” he continued.

“Everyone was a wee bit nervous about the new pitch as we only trained on it for the first time on Thursday night.

“If today’s anything to go by we’ll have plenty of good Saturday’s here.

“We’re going alright, we were maybe a bit unlucky the first two games, but he last two or three weeks we’ve really upped the ante and I thought today we were superb from start to finish.”

The Bannsiders have crunch matches against Crusaders and Glenavon on the horizon with ‘Skinner’ also having a big day pencilled in the calendar.

“Crusaders on Monday will be tough and then Glenavon on the Friday night,” he concluded.

“Then I get married on Saturday so it’s a big two weeks.

“Of course Saturday’s the bigger match!

“Every game’s a big game but we’ve had some good performances recently and we’ll go to Crusaders looking forward to it.”