Upping a gear

ORAN Kearney is hoping his side can create the same volume of chances but be more ruthless as they face Crusaders tomorrow afternoon…

The Bannsiders would defeat Newry City last time out through Matthew Shevlin’s close range finish but missed a litany of chances to make it a more comfortable evening on the Ballycastle Road.

Despite acknowledging that he would rather see the ball hit the ball of the net, Kearney alluded to the fact that his side were proving to be creative in the final third.

“They’ve been super all season and really, really good at Seaview,” said Kearney.

“They’re right up there amongst it like ourselves, so it’ll be a good game.

“It’s a big game for both clubs and one that we’ll look forward to.

“We know in the past it’ll take a really big performance and given Crusaders’ home form, we’ll probably have to go up a gear.

“We made it hard for ourselves on Tuesday night but I can’t get away from the quality of the performance and I said that to the players.

“The most pleasing aspect and people will lament the amount of chances we missed, but we created loads and that’s the most important thing.

“You’ve got to be there to miss them and by God we did that.

“Thankfully it didn’t cost us but the challenge is to go out this afternoon and create close to that level of chances again.

“I think if we do that over the course of the season, we’ll score more than we miss.”

The Stripes missed eight players for Tuesday night’s clash and Kearney is hoping to have as many fit bodies back as soon as possible.

“We’re not a big squad, we never have been, but we’ve a lot of quality in the squad,” he continued.

“On Tuesday night, we were down to 12 or 13 fit players, but the 11 who played the game showed the quality that we were still able to field.

“It’s important that other people who are in the team at the minute carry the can and they’ve done that.

“Ideally, we would just like that bit of depth back.

“It’s a three game week and all that goes with it, so it’s important to try and share the load.”