Under-fire Braidside boss Tommy Wright had a number of players missing from this tie, including Mark Picking, Davitt Walsh and Aaron Callaghan. So a number of changes were made from the mid-week defeat to the Crues.

Paul Murphy, Stuart King and Stephen Lowry returned to the starting eleven, whilst there was a full debut for Ballykeel winger, Gary Baird.

The Sky Blues started the first half brightly as they put Crusaders to the sword, but failed to make anything from their chances.

Both Albert Watson and Simon Kelly came close for the visitors, but it was teenage defender Johnny Flynn who came closest when his shot was cleared off the line. Flynn was almost the hero on his full debut on Wednesday night, after he chalked up his first senior goal.

Tommy Wright went into the interval, the happier of the two managers, with Stephen Lowry coming close again just before the break, with the score remaining 0-0.

Crusaders did have the ball in the back of the net on 41 minutes, when Chris Morrow fired home, but his goal was disallowed by referee Arnold Hunter.

The home struck a legitimate goal on the hour mark though, when Darren Lockhart’s free-kick found the completely unmarked Steven Coulter who headed past Paul Murphy for the opening goal of the game.

On 73 minutes Stephen Baxter’s side killed the game off with a second goal. Crues’ substitute Mark McQuillan crossed from the left and Chris Morrow rose above Lee Patrick with ease to head home at the back post to double the home side’s lead.

With nine minutes remaining, Coulter nabbed his second of the game when he finished off the good build up work from Morrow and David Rainey.

"I am amazed we lost 3-nil, but then I should not be that amazed," he said.

"We dominated the first half, anyone could see that, but we go a goal down and then crumble like a deck of cards.

"I defended them on Wednesday night after losing 2-1 to Crusaders in the County Antrim Shield, but I can't defend that second half performance.

"More should show the stomach for the fight. The quality in the first half was good, but the second was a different story."

Teams:

CRUSADERS	BALLYMENA UNITED
1: SHANNON, Gregg	1: MURPHY, Paul
2: MAGOWAN, David	2: KELLY, Simon
3: McBRIDE, Stephen	3: McCLEAN, Craig
4: MORROW, Chris	4: WATSON, Aidan
5: MONTGOMERY, Aaron	5: WATSON, Albert (c)
6: SMYTH, Gary	6: FLYNN, Johnny
7: TUMELTY, Ryan	7: BAIRD, Gary
8: LOCKHART, Darren (c)	8: PATRICK, Lee
9: COULTER, Steven	9: LOWRY, Stephen
10: RAINEY, David	10: KELBIE, Kevin
11: McALLISTER, Eamon	11: KING, Stuart
Substitutes	-
12: LENEGHAN, Lee	12: SCATES, Garth
Replaced Ryan Tumelty (88 mins)	Replaced Aidan Watson (68 mins)
13: HOGG, Aaron	14: MELAUGH, Gavin
Replaced Darren Lockhart (87 mins)	Not Used
15: CADDELL, Declan	15: REID, Randal
Replaced Darren Lockhart (87 mins)	Replaced Gary Baird (63 mins)
16: McQUILLAN, Mark	16: CUSHLEY, David
Replaced Eamon McAllister (46 mins)	Replaced Stephen Lowry (63 mins)
	17: WRAY, Thomas
	Not Used
Yellow Cards:	-
None	None
Red Cards:	-
None	None