The Blues could have opened the scoring inside the opening quarter-of-an-hour through Aidan O'Kane and Glenn Ferguson only for both to finish poorly while, on 21 minutes, United keeper Paul Murphy failed to gather a Pat McShane cross but the home attack failed to capitalise.

Then, four minutes from the break, Kris Lindsay really should have done better when he fired wide from close range after Peter Thompson had flicked on an O'Kane corner.

The deadlock was finally broken on the hour mark after Ferguson released Thompson who managed to send the ball home from just inside the area despite the attentions of defender Simon Kelly.

Ballymena might have levelled 10 minutes later, however, when a lack of concentration from Lindsay let Kevin Kelbie in but the Scotsman failed to hit the target despite having the time to compose himself.