Paddy McLaughlin has defended star striker Joe Gormley after he spurned a golden opportunity to secure all three points for Cliftonville in the north Belfast derby against Crusaders on Monday night.
As we moved into additional time at Seaview with the game balanced on a knife edge at 2-2 Ronan Hale teed up Gormley for what looked like a precious winner for the Reds.
But the ace marksman uncharacteristically fluffed his lines with the goal at his mercy and fired wide from six yards.
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Boss McLaughlin though attributed no blame to Gormley and backed him to bounce back with more crucial goals for Cliftonville, like he has done throughout his career.
"That just proves that he is human," said the Reds boss.
"He's a phenomenon and no-one can compare his goal-scoring record with anyone because he's so good and so clinical.
"On another day Joe puts that in nine times out of ten.
"It was a great ball in and with the defender and goalkeeper coming towards him he maybe takes his eye off the ball for a split second.
"Joe will score plenty of goals for us between now and the end of the season, and will score a lot of important goals for us over the next few years.
"That was a minor blip tonight, I'm sure he's disappointed, but there's no criticism of Joe at all. He's scored plenty up until now and I'm sure he will continue to do so."
A Ryan Curran brace was sandwiched by spectacular strikes from Jordan Forsythe and Ross Clarke as both teams had to make do with a point.
It was not the result either team would have wanted but McLaughlin was pleased to see such a competitive encounter with their north Belfast rivals.
"That was a proper north Belfast derby," he said.
"Where have those games gone over the last couple of meetings?
"I don't think there was a booking or a tackle made in the Boxing Day game.
"Tonight was the complete opposite and that's how it should be played as long as we stay within the rules of the game.
"It was end-to-end, it was feisty at times, it was high energy and high tempo.
"I'm sure anybody watching would have appreciated both sides going toe-to-toe and giving it their all.
"Both sides came away with a point, we're slightly disappointed as we had chances to win it.
"Crusaders is a difficult place to come to and any point is valuable, so we'll take it and move on to Saturday."
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