With the start of the new Carling IFA Premiership season, United manager Roy Walker gave debuts to five of his new signings in his new-look Ballymena side; Gavin Taggart, Ormo Okunaiya, Darren Lockhart, Philip Carson and Andy Smith all started for United for the first time in competitive action.

Ballymena and their debutants started poorly and allowed Cliftonville to dominate proceedings from the start, after some poor defending allowed Boyce to fire the North Belfast Reds in front.

The home side were fortunate not to go two goals behind when Boyce broke the offside trap but his lobbed effort took a wicked bounce off the hard surface and went the wrong side of the crossbar with United goalkeeper Sean O'Neill helpless to prevent the effort.

Walker's men soon pulled themselves back into the match as Nathan McConnell and Darren Lockhart came close without testing Connolly. Debutant Andy Smith came closest for his new side when he forced the visiting custodian into a good save from a 25-yard free-kick just before the interval.

Early in the second half, full-back Michael Smith almost scored an equaliser for a resurgent Ballymena. After some good link up play with strikers Nathan McConnell and Andy Smith, the young defender fired his effort over the bar.

Walker brought on David Cushley and Paul McNeill as he looked to turn some of his side's second half dominance into goals. In the final minutes it was the two substitutes who nearly claimed a point for United as Cushley's stinging effort was well saved by Connolly and McNeill seen an effort cleared off the line and his follow up flash aimlessly over the crossbar.

Manager Roy Walker was disappointed with the result, but certainly optimistic regarding the performance;

"I thought the game was very even but we started poorly in the first 20 minutes and lost the goal but for the next 25 minutes we were better but didn't get a favourable drop of the ball in the box," he said.

"In the second-half we had a couple of really good moves but all in all I didn't think we deserved to lose and a draw would have been a fair result. But it's not and I won't get too downbeat and hopefully we can go forward from here."

The Sky Blues are back in action on Tuesday night in the first round of the County Antrim Shield at home to Harland & Wolff Welders, as they look to kick start their season.

Picture: www.presseye.com

Teams:

BALLYMENA UNITED	CLIFTONVILLE
1: O'NEILL, Sean	1: CONNOLLY, John
2: SMITH, Michael	2: FLEMING, Liam
3: COLLIGAN, Lee	3: HOLLAND, Barry
4: HAVERON, Gary (c)	4: CATNEY, Ryan
5: TAGGART, Gavin	5: DONAGHY, Ciaran
6: MUIR, Paul	6: CALDWELL, Ciaran
7: OKUNAIYA, Ormon	7: BOYCE, Liam
8: CARSON, Philip	8: O'CONNOR, Kieran
9: SMITH, Andy	9: SCANNELL, Chris
10: McCONNELL, Nathan	10: DOWNEY, Conor
11: LOCKHART, Darren	11: MURPHY, Francis
Substitutes	-
12: ANDERSON, Noel	12: SMYTH, Aaron
Replaced Gavin Taggart (61 mins)	Replaced Liam Boyce (62 mins)
13: SURGENOR, Mark	14: BURNS, Mark
Not Used	Not Used
14: WATSON, Aidan	15: CLARK, Mark
Not Used	Not Used
15: CUSHLEY, David	16: McALINDEN, David
Replaced Darren Lockhart (61 mins)	Not Used
16: McNEILL, Paul	17: BOYD, Ciaran
Replaced Nathan McConnell (79 mins)	Replaced Francis Murphy (73 mins)
Yellow Cards:	-
LOCKHART, Darren (36 mins)	Unknown
COLLIGAN, Lee (60 mins)
Red Cards:	-
None	None