Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Belfast Live
Belfast Live
Sport
Steven Crawford

Oran Kearney admits to learning from mistakes after 'great week' for Coleraine

There's an old adage in football that you never change a winning side.

For Coleraine boss Oran Kearney though learning from your past mistakes is more important.

Back in August the Bannsiders were set to face Glenavon in the final match of a three-game week.

Read next: Mick McDermott says he's 'never seen anything like it' as situation worsens

With on the previous Saturday and Tuesday over Portadown and Carrick Rangers respectively already in the bag Kearney decided to go with the same starting eleven against the Lurgan Blues, who had the luxury of not playing in midweek.

A first defeat of the season followed as Glenavon ran out 3-1 winners at The Showgrounds with the Bannsiders boss admitting afterwards that he should have changed things.

Fast forward four months and Coleraine found themselves in a similar scenario again.

They defeated Dungannon Swifts last Saturday before eventually seeing off Cliftonville in the BetMcLean League Cup semi-final after extra-time and penalties on Tuesday.

Despite the euphoria of reaching another final Kearney admitted he was never going to go with the same eleven in the 2-0 win over Crusaders on Friday night with the Glenavon lesson still fresh in his mind.

"110 per cent that was in my mind when picking the team, it was probably every part of the thinking," he said.

"The other side was we had a euphoric win on Tuesday night but it wasn't enough to convince me that you go with the same again.

"You live and learn. Listen, I make mistakes, players make mistakes, everybody makes mistakes, and it didn't work that night against Glenavon.

"We had to try and do it a different way tonight.

"It's been a good week but we knew to get a result tonight it probably wasn't going to be our prettiest with the conditions and everything also with the numbers that we've covered this week.

"The numbers that we covered on Tuesday night alone, some of the players were up around 14 or 15k, they played 120 minutes and big sprint distances as well.

"For a 72 hour turnaround to go and get into a game like this against a team of Crusaders' calibre we knew that it wasn't going to be pretty.

"Could we nick a couple of goals however we could get them and ideally hope that we can keep doing what we've been doing at the other end.

"To be fair to everybody again they were monsters tonight."

READ NEXT:

Sign up to our free sports newsletter to get the latest headlines to your inbox.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.