Larne's hopes of retaining the Irish Premiership title suffered another blow after a 4-2 defeat by Cliftonville at Solitude.

The Reds, who have won their last two games and scored 10 goals in the process, hit the ground running with Rory Hale's quickfire double putting them in front inside eight minutes.

Shaun Leppard header gave the Reds more breathing space, but a Dan Bent penalty on 72 minutes followed by a Matty Lusty goal with 10 minutes to go set up a grandstand finish.

The visitors piled on the pressure, but it was Cliftonville who scored again as substitute Rhyss Campbell broke away to score the fourth with the last kick of the game condemning Gary Haveron's side to a third defeat in six games.

Fresh from hitting seven against Carrick Rangers last Saturday, the hosts carried that momentum into this game and found themselves two goals to the good inside eight minutes.

It was Hale who did the damage firstly racing onto a Joe Sheridan through ball before lobbing Rohan Ferguson in the sixth minute before beating the Larne stopper from outside the box just two minutes later.

It could have been even better for the Reds if Ben Quinn had converted in between the Hale goals, with Ferguson getting down well to gather his low drive.

Larne spurned an opportunity to get back into the game in the 17th minute as Dylan Sloan teed up Lusty, but he dragged his shot wide of the far post.

The chances continued to come as Quinn glanced a Dean McMaster corner wide of the far post before Leppard blocked another Lusty effort at the other end.

The visitors made a double change at the break with Leroy Millar and Kevin O'Hara coming on for Ronan Doherty and Paul O'Neill, but it was the hosts who continued to pose a threat with Hale having a header save from a Liam McStravick cross.

A third goal for Cliftonville duly arrived in the 61st minute as Leppard rose highest to glance home McMaster's inswinging corner to all but extinguish Larne's hopes of a comeback.

The visitors weren't done just yet though as they got a glimmer of hope on 72 minutes as Bent slotted home from the penalty spot after Lusty had been brought down by Joel Thompson.

Larne's tails were up as O'Hara forced PJ Morrison into a smart save, but the keeper was caught in no-man's land minute later as the reigning champions pulled another goal back.

It was Lusty who raced onto James Simpson's through ball before lobbing the ball over the onrushing Reds keeper to set up a massive final 10 minutes.

Larne piled on the pressure but right at the death they were hit with a final sucker-punch as Campbell raced unopposed onto Joe Gormley's pass before slamming the ball past Ferguson to seal the points.

Cliftonville manager Jim Magilton: "Tactically we were so good and at 3-0 it was near perfect performance. But when you analyse the quality of the opposition you know that there's going to be some nervy moments and they provided that.

"We started to have a little wobble but stuck to our guns again and showed great resilience and great character. There were so many fantastic individual performances, but credit goes to the team and the lads that came off the bench too.

"It was a collective performance so they should be immensely proud of their performance and their fitness levels again were through the roof. It's a credit to them, we went through a little wobble this season and people got a little bit ahead of themselves.

"We don't seek approval, but what we do, we knuckle down, we go again and we have great belief in them."

Larne manager Gary Haveron: "We need to go away and look at the game and see what we could have done better, what I could have done better, how I could have set the team up differently.

"I thought they just were too dominant in terms of picking up a lot of second balls and asking questions of us, more than us putting them in the back foot. They took their chance early in the game, but we've had a chance before that with Matty [Lusty], and I think in these games you've got to try and keep the crowd out of the game and keep them quiet once.

"They're scoring goals freely, they rotate and move well, but we never handled it and we never dealt with it, and I need to look at it because it was me that picks the team, it was me that set the team up, and I need to look at what I could have done differently and how I could have shaped this up differently."