Dixon Park display will be talked about for years to come - for all wrong reasons

There was an increasing chill in the air as Ards’ players emerged from the dressing room of their adopted ‘home’ at Dixon Park to celebrate their first win as a Premiership club with their friends and family who had remained in the grandstand.

Just up the corridor, the Ballymena United dressing room door remained firmly shut - that is until a television reporter knocked on it, seeking Glenn Ferguson for a post-match interview.

When the manager emerged, he did do with a facial expression which said more than any words which he would subsequently use in the interview.

Friday night’s game was one of those which, I suspect, will crop up in United fans’ conversation for years to come.

Not, sadly, in the ‘do you remember that great night against Ards at Dixon Park?’ sense. Instead, Friday night’s display will become a benchmark; a yardstick when comparing the sheer awfulness of one bad performance against another - “that was nearly as bad as that night against Ards at Dixon Park”.

It’s hard to comprehend exactly where such a dire Ballymena display had come from, given the bright performance against Dungannon, on the back of that stunning victory at Seaview, but this was one where, even after about 20 minutes, it became apparent that United were struggling with the basics.

Put that together with an opposing team full of endeavour and quicker to get to loose balls and the recipe for disaster was complete - the fact that Ards’ two goals - scored incidentally by two players plucked from Championship side Dundela in the summer - would have graced a much bigger stage was of no consolation to United fans as they made the short trip back home over the Collin.

Ballymena remain the Irish League football equivalent of the 1980s smash hit movie Ghostbusters - if you’re an opposing team struggling for form or searching for your first points of the season, “who ya gonna call?”...Ballymena United. If I had a pound for all the times over the years that a club has ended a depressing sequence of results, or turned their season around on the back of beating the Sky Blues, I’d be typing this from sunnier climes!

Friday night’s was the sort of performance that makes you think that freshening up the squad for home games against Portadown and Cliftonville this week would be distinct possibility - the struggle of the fringe players to overcome Ballymoney in the League Cup might make that option less viable for Ferguson.

Follow Ballymena Times Sports Editor Stephen Alexander on Twitter (@Stephen_Bmena).