Warren Feeney left bewildered over Bobby Burns' dismissal but praises Glentoran players for their performance in incident-packed fixture against Crusaders

The Glens fell behind to an early Daniel Larmour header but responded to lead by the hour mark through goals from Jay Donnelly and Shay McCartan’s penalty.

However, the hosts would be reduced to ten men as Burns was dismissed for a second bookable offence after being adjudged to be time wasting with twenty minutes left on the clock.

Feeney would be sent-off himself for his protestations at the decision, with the Irish Cup holders making their numerical advantage count late on as Jordan Owens scrambled home an 88th minute equaliser.

A third red card would be produced by referee Raymond Crangle into stoppage time as Crusaders ace Jordan Forsythe also received his marching orders after picking up a second caution for a foul on Fuad Sule.

Speaking to Glentoran TV after the game, Feeney credited his players for their “outstanding” performance and believes Burns’ dismissal by Crangle was a “poor decision”.

He said: "I want to praise my players as I thought they were outstanding from start to finish.

"Yes, we conceded the goals and there's a lot of people hurt in there.

"As for Bobby, I thought it was a poor decision.

"A tactical time waste whenever the two players crossed each other - all I didn't want was my left-back hitting the corner and having to run 90 yards back.

"If that's a time waste with 25 minutes to go, I don't know about football.

"I want to say well done to my boys, they played against a good football team tonight and they're honest.

"I thought we played well, moved the ball well and I thought we were in control of the game if I'm being honest.

"I want to give them a good pat on the back for how they performed.”

Feeney also was quick to praise the Glentoran support for getting behind the players as the draw means they move up to 4th place in the Sports Direct Premiership table.

The Glens chief made two alterations to his starting line-up as Aidan Wilson and Burns were drafted in, with Feeney believing those changes aided his side at both ends of the pitch.

"I looked at it because Crusaders are a very, very good team,” he continued.

"They've scored a lot of goals and you can see why they're effective.

"But I like to see games and how we can hurt them and I thought we did that tonight.

"I thought we did it in abundance, I thought we were very good but at the end of the day, I think my players are disappointed which is a good thing.

"It's still early days in the season, we will get some players back and I wanted to praise them because I thought they were outstanding.

"The fans, everyone, you could see when we were running forward the fans were getting behind the players and that's what I want to bring to this football club."