Cliftonville to meet Coleraine in European play-off final

Cliftonville will meet Coleraine in Sunday's play-off final at the Showgrounds

Cliftonville will meet Coleraine in the Irish Premiership play-off final after both picked up victories in their respective semi-finals.

Jack Keaney and Eric McWoods scored late at the Oval to give Cliftonville a 2-0 win against Glentoran.

Declan McManus scored what proved to be the winner after three minutes to help Coleraine past Crusaders in Ruaidhri Higgins' first game in charge of the Bannsiders.

The decider will now take place at the Showgrounds on Sunday with kick-off set for 14:00 BST.

Reds leave it late to beat Glens

After a nervy opening, Cliftonville had a chance when Ryan Curran reacted quickest to Odhran Casey's near post cross, but the striker couldn't keep his flicked effort on target.

At the other end, Kodi Lyons-Foster got his head on the end of a Jonny Russell long throw-in, but his effort lacked the pace to trouble Lewis Ridd.

Glentoran came close on the half-hour when Russell teed up Joe Thomson from 25- yards but although his daisy-cutter of a shot beat the fully extended Ridd, it whistled inches wide of the far post.

Axel Piesold played a clever ball in behind the Glentoran defence which McWoods ran onto, but his effort hit the side netting.

Glentoran had another good chance when Thomson's cross was met by David Fisher but Ridd was able to save with his legs.

Glentoran forced a number of openings in the opening stages of the second half but couldn't put efforts on target to trouble Ridd.

Just as it looked as though the game would go to extra time, Cliftonville broke the deadlock with three minutes remaining when Rory Hale took a short free-kick to Keaney, who spun on the edge of the area before firing a low angled shot past Daniel Gyollai.

Worse was to follow for Glentoran soon afterwards as Cammy Palmer was shown a second yellow card for bringing down Hale.

With Glentoran pushing forward in search of an equaliser, Cliftonville caught them on the counter-attack deep in stoppage time as a through ball released McWoods, who ran on to clip a shoot past Gyollai, with the ball trickling into the net via the inside of the post.

McManus makes the difference for Bannsiders

It was the perfect start to Higgins' reign as Coleraine manager as the home side broke the deadlock just three minutes in when McManus fired Corey Smith's low cross into the top right corner.

Coleraine piled on the pressure and pushed for a quick second goal, but the away side's defence were able to clear their lines and deny the Bannsiders a more comfortable lead.

Goal scorer McManus then had two chances to double his goal tally for the evening. The first when his effort from a Jamie Glackin cross was gathered by Jonny Tuffey before the striker sent a powerful free-kick a whisker wide.

Crusaders didn't have a shot on target in the first half and despite enjoying more possession after the restart, they continued to struggle to test Max Little.

At the other end, stopper Tuffey was alert to substitute Kyle Spence's low effort and thwarted the chance.

In the final 10 minutes, Jordan Stewart burst into the box and beat his marker before sending a powerful effort into the side netting.

Glackin had the final effort of the game in stoppage time when he tried his luck from 20-yards, but his effort was just over the crossbar.