ROY Walker's Ballymena side had to come from behind against Carrick Rangers at the Showgrounds in this pre-season friendly.

Stephen Small's Carrick Rangers side had stepped in at short notice to replace English side Blackpool, who cancelled their short tour of Northern Ireland at the eleventh hour.

The game started fairly evenly, with the two sides fully committed to taking an early control of the game, the home side struck the first effort on ten minutes when Joe McDonnell fired over from just outside the box.

However, it was the Taylors Avenue side that took a well merited lead on 15 minutes when Rangers' captain, Chris Lins, fired a superb header past Alan Blayney in the United goal.

This seemingly woken the Braidmen and in the following few minutes, both Davitt Walsh and Neil Teggart had the ball in the back of the net - however both efforts were ruled out for offside.

With 23 minutes on the clock the home side struck back when Liam Mullan's corner from the left hand side was powerfully met by a downward header from Thomas Wray.

The Braidmen took a deserved lead with eight minutes remaining in the half with some great build up play as Mark Picking released Joe McDonnell down the right flank and he squared the ball across the face of goal to give Davitt Walsh the simple task of knocking the ball home from close range.

Two minutes later in-form striker Neil Teggart gave the Sky Blues a two goal cushion when he beat the offside trap and composed himself to hit a superb half volley past the stranded goalkeeper.

At the break Walker introduced five substitutes at the break including Aidan Watson who made his first appearance of the pre-season campaign.

The home side continued where they had left off before the break when Davitt Walsh seen his close range header well saved and tipped onto the bar.

Substitute Stuart King's low drilled shot on the hour mark forced the visiting goalkeeper into a save.

With 20 minutes remaining, it looked almost certain that Ballymena would score their fourth of the evening as Joe McDonnell raced through the middle and slid the ball underneath the advancing goalkeeper on the edge of the box, but the ball trickled agonisingly wide.

With the final whistle approaching, there was cause for concern as striker Neil Teggart, who bagged his fifth goal in four games tonight, was carried off on a stretcher and taken to hospital with an injury to his knee.

A good workout for the Warden Street side, who will meet another Championship opponent this Saturday with the visit of Portadown for the club's annual Open Day.

Teams:

BALLYMENA UNITED	CARRICK RANGERS
1: BLAYNEY, Alan	Team Unknown
2: WRAY, Thomas
3: McCLEAN, Craig
4: MELAUGH, Gavin
5: WATSON, Albert (c)
6: HAVERON, Gary
7: PICKING, Mark
8: McDONNELL, Joe
9: TEGGART, Neil
10: WALSH, Davitt
11: MULLAN, Liam
Substitutes	-
15: STEWART, Aaron
Replaced Gary Haveron (46 mins)	Replaced Aaron Stewart (46 mins)
16: HOGAN, Liam
Replaced Thomas Wray (46 mins)
17: KING, Stuart
Replaced Liam Mullan (46 mins)
18: WATSON, Aidan
Replaced Gavin Melaugh (46 mins)
19: SCATES, Garth
Replaced Mark Picking (46 mins)
20: O'NEILL, Sean
Not Used
Yellow Cards:	-
None
Red Cards:	-
None	None