Kelly: “Everyone was excellent”

COLERAINE midfielder Patrick Kelly admits he enjoyed his second-half performance as the Bannsiders made a return to winning ways yesterday afternoon…

The 17-year-old put in a Man of the Match performance against the Glens as he had a say in all three goals that were converted by Matthew Shevlin (2) and Aaron Jarvis as Coleraine recorded a 3-2 win.

Speaking to Coleraine TV after the game, the Northern Ireland youth international was thankful for the advice given to him by Aaron Traynor as he played left midfielder after the break.

“The last few weeks have been tough,” he said.

“Results haven’t really gone our way. We’ve started games quite well but we haven’t taken our chances.

“Today I just felt we were a lot better all over the pitch.

“I enjoyed myself in the second half.

“I think the whole team played well, and Aaron Traynor behind me really helped me.

“I moved left in the second half and it’s not somewhere I’d normally play, but he was talking to me through the game which helped me.

“I thought Jarvis and Lowry in the middle and Josh were excellent, but everyone was superb today.”

Coleraine finalise their Danske Bank Premiership campaign with an away trip to Linfied and Kelly is hopeful that the Bannsiders can carry on the momentum earned from yesterday’s success.

“It’s not that we didn’t have anything to play for because obviously we have the play-offs coming up and everyone is trying to get themselves in the team,” he added.

“But results haven’t really been going our way and we felt a bit of pressure coming in from the fans.

“We knew it was important to go and get a big result today and hopefully we can kick on now and go and get another win next week.

“It was good that we went 1-0 up today because over the last few weeks we haven’t taken the lead and we have struggled to come back if we went 1-0. down.

“Even when they equalised it was good that we kept going and scored another two goals.

“It’s another tough game.

“Obviously they will be going for the league title, but we’ll go up there and give it all we’ve got and hopefully win the game.”