Man of the match

The long-term absentee made his much-anticipated return to first team action and looked as accomplished as ever. Under almost constant bombardment in the first half, Lindsay marshalled his defence and was in the thick of the action, frequently the man to deny Glentoran’s attack.

Lindsay also came close to netting at the other end in the second half but Kyle Neill’s corner flew just inches over his head.

“Kris was very good,” said boss Gary Hamilton.

“It’s a credit to him after being out for so long and then coming back with such a good performance.

“He tired in the last five or 10 minutes but he’s a quality player and if he stays fit, there’s nobody better at coming for headers and in terms of his attitude and application to the game.

“It’s all first class and we’re hoping that there’s no reason why he won’t stay fit now. If he does, he’ll be a big player for Glenavon this season.

“People have to be patient with him as well because he’s just back after not playing much football for over a year.”

Lindsay did have a scare in the second half when he went down holding his troublesome knee but Hamilton also confirmed that the knock was nothing to worry about:

“He just clashed knees with one of the Glens players and he was ok.”

Other than Lindsay, few players can take much from that display. However, Andy Coleman again proved his worth as a top-notch shot-stopper and half-time subs Andrew Mitchell and Marc Brown added some much needed life to the team.

“Marc Brown was my own man of the match,” said Hamilton.

“I thought he was exceptional at getting the ball into the channels and we got a lot of joy out of that. Andrew Mitchell did okay on Saturday but he has to work harder.

“He has everything in his locker and we firmly believe that he should be playing in England. That’s not exaggerating things because Stephen Robinson, the NI U19 boss, thinks the same.

“He’s a player that we have high hopes for but on Saturday we didn’t feel that he did enough work for a player who came on for 45 minutes.”