Cliftonville and Linfield successfully kicked off their Sports Direct Premiership campaigns with victories over Glenavon and Dungannon Swifts respectively, while Newry City bounced back to defeat Carrick Rangers.

The Reds, playing under new boss Jim Magilton for the first time, swept to a convincing three-goal defeat of Glenavon at Solitude.

They needed just six minutes to open the scoring when Joe Gormley raced onto a ball over the top to chip keeper Rory Brown.

New arrival Sean Stewart marked his debut with Cliftonville’s second midway through the first half after being presented with a simple tap in when Ben Wilson’s initial effort was pushed out by Brown.

Then, not long from the break, Gormley doubled his tally with another finish over the keeper, this time from a Ronan Doherty ball.

Linfield also hit three goals but were made work all the way by Dungannon Swifts at Stangmore Park.

Scoreless for most of the first half, the deadlock was finally broken on 42 minutes when Chris McKee ran onto a perfectly weighted Joel Cooper cross to nod past Declan Dunne.

The Swifts levelled just moments later, however, through Kealan Dillon courtesy of an excellent free-kick into the top corner from around 25 yards.

Linfield regained the advantage early in the second half after Cooper reacted quickest to the rebound after his initial effort had been saved.

Kirk Millar added a third seven minutes from time with a sweeping finish into the top corner from the edge of the box but Ben Gallagher pulled one back for the home side right at the end of normal time to set up a tense finish.

Meanwhile, at the Loughshore Leisure Arena, Newry City bounced back from last week’s defeat with a 2-0 win over Carrick Rangers.

Lorcan Forde opened the scoring on 14 minutes with a low strike past Ross Glendinning, with Daragh Owens doubling up just after the half-hour mark after blasting home an unstoppable strike from the edge of the area.