Down’s senior side have at last won their first game of the season.

It has taken the club until early November to register its first win after an indifferent start to the new campaign, but last weekend against Ballymena at Malone Park, home skipper Jeremy McCready led by example weighing in with a hat-trick.

Down welcomed back Paul Neill and he made a difference to the heartbeat of the team which has been sluggish over recent weeks. Initially though, that trend looked as though it was going to continue when Ballymena opened the scoring.

The visitors took the lead in the ninth minute with a rather farcical goal. A hopeful ball drilled into the Down penalty area appeared harmless and with McCready telling his defenders to leave the ball they duly obliged, allowing Matthew Corbett to nip in on the blind side to score.

The soft pitch was making carrying the ball difficult, but the conditions were the same for both teams and Ballymena's opening goal came after Down's Mark Elliott should have scored at the other end and David Ferris saw a crisp shot saved by Alastair Gibson in the Ballymena goal.

Elliott should have grabbed an equaliser in the 18th minute after some terrific work by Gavin Ringland and the duo combined moments later with Elliott denied by Gibson.

The hardworking Paul Tate drilled a shot against the base of the Ballymena post in the 34th minute and with the umpires about to signal the end of the half, Down scored a deserved equaliser. Chris Ferguson went on a penetrating run and picked out Ringland who cut the ball back form Elliott to score from close range.

Skipper McCready moved up front in the second half and was replaced in the heart of the defence by Willie Price. Suddenly, the home side had a lot more purpose about them looked dangerous going forward.

McCready thought he had given his side the lead in the 46th minute with a superb first time shot but Gibson denied him. But two minutes later the Down man was celebrating when he was in the right place at the right time to make it 2-1 after some great build-up play involving Neill.

Ringland then missed several chances as Ballymena were forced to defend deeper and deeper and in the 55th minute McCready grabbed his second goal of the afternoon but Down should have been awarded a "goal" before he scored.

Ringland's shot crashed against the stantion at the back of the goal. The ball was clearly over the line but came back into play. At this point, Adam McKee fired it goalwards but it rebounded off both posts before the ball nestled on the goal-line and McCready tapped it home.

In the closing stages the impressive Ringland set up his skipper yet again and McCready was delighted to drive the ball home to complete his hat-trick.