Thistle to fight for Kingdom Kegs Cup

May 30 2008

SCONE Thistle will be on full steam on Monday night at home to St Andrews in the semi-final of the Kingdom Kegs Cup.

Thistle are hopeful of a good home support and that they will give the team plenty of vocal encouragement in their bid to become the first Perthshire team to reach the final of this cup.

But first, boss Derek Adam and his players have tomorrow’s league meeting at home with Thornton Hibs who won the corresponding fixture by 3–0.

Thistle will be striving to avenge that defeat and more importantly collect the three points.

If they were to do so they will move a further rung up the league table, which would give their confidence a lift going into Monday night’s semi final clash.

The Thistle squad is still quite depleted as Steven Watt, Gary Christie and Alan Cameron are still out due to injuries.

There’s also a doubt about Grant McGregor, who is suffering from a back injury problem, and he may have a late test.

Mark and Chris Hamilton are also expected to miss the game as they are unavailable.

Derek Adam expects to have a squad of 14 or 15 available.

Thornton Hibs made the headlines this season by reaching the semi final of the Scottish Cup which was a great achievement by the Fifers.

The Hibs will finish fourth in the league table regardless of the result at Scone.

Thistle are the second big county team they will have met this week as they had Bankfoot as their guests on Tuesday night.

Hibs won the match 2–1.

The Hibs expect to travel to Scone with a strong squad, although there are slight doubts about John Dickson and Russell Taylor, who suffered knocks against the Bankies.

Returning to the squad are strikers Graeme Dursley and Ralph Hunter. Hibs like their hosts are keen to wind up their league programme with a win, which should lead to an entertaining game.

Monday nights semi final looks like being a very entertaining encounter.

Both Thistle and St Andrews had to overcome the odds in their quarter final ties to make it into the last four of the Kingdom Kegs Cup.

This semi final clash should pull out a very good home crowd who hopefully will be given the satisfaction of seeing Thistle make it through to the final of this competition.

In midweek games, Blairgowrie met Tayport in the semi final of the Currie Cup at their Canniepairt ground and while Blair turned in a gutsy performance it was the super league side who won their way through to the final by a 3–0 margin.

The first of those Tayport goals came after only five minutes when a good Tayport move saw Birdie Craik and Darren Scott combine to set up a chance for Kevin Kelly which he accepted and Tayport were 1–0 ahead.

This was still the scoreline with the interval only four minutes away and it was at this point that Blair came close to getting back on level terms.

Darren Neave coming in from the right hit a cross into Ryan Menzies who was in the Tayport penalty box. Ryan connected well with the cross and the ball looked to be heading towards the back of the net until keeper Fraser Fitzpatrick brilliantly saved the strikers effort.

Tayport increased their lead to 2–0 10 minutes into the second half when Birdie Craik connected with a long throw in from Ross Gunnion. He flicked it on the Darren Scott who beat keeper Mark Nugent from close range.

Tayport went on to make it 3–0 in 65 minutes when Kevin Kelly scored his second goal of the game and that really was the final nail in the coffin for Blair, who to their credit, never stopped trying right up to the final whistle and that was the end of Blair’s season.

Bankfoot were away to Thornton Hibs in their final league game of the season and unfortunately the Bankies didn’t finish with a favourable result but it certainly wasn’t for the lack of effort and their performance especially in the second half should have earned them at least a share of the points.

This was mainly due to their failure to take the chances that their outfield play created.

This was pretty much a game of two halves.

The very strong wind that prevailed throughout the 90 minutes caused this situation.

The Hibs had the wind at their backs in the first half and right from the kick off it was evident that it was going to be an important factor in the game and they were soon swarming round the Bankies goalmouth and in the space of four minutes they had won two corners which brought them no joy.

In the eighth minute they forced Bankies to concede another corner and their centre half Mike McAinsh met the ball but his strong header was brilliantly saved by Bankies keeper Darren McGarry.

Darren managed to punch the ball away but it was deflected to John Dickson who promptly dispatched the ball into the back of the net.

Bankies despite being under the cosh for most of the time defended well and on the half hour mark full back Danny Dobbie managed to make a break up the park and hit a cracking drive from just outside the penalty box, but it whistled past the post.

The Hibs responded immediately to this near set back and with just two more minutes on the clock they increased their lead to 2–0.

A third ball was blocked by Bankies centre half Gavin McLeod but unfortunately the ball rebounded to Hibs striker Gary Braid who whacked it past Darren McGarry from just inside the penalty box.

The Bankies sailed into the attack from the restart of the second half and they did most of the attacking but despite all their efforts there were no more goals.

The game was in the 84th minute when they finally pulled one back. John Mitchell who had been causing the Hibs defence problems was brought down in the penalty box and Stephen Moon smacked home the resultant spot kick to make it 2–1.

In the remaining minutes Bankies pushed hard for the equaliser and another effort from John Mitchell went past the post.

The game was in stoppage time when the Bankies forced two corners which saw their keeper Darren McGarry come racing up to join in the siege but it was to no avail as the Hibs managed to hang on to their 2–1 lead and Bankies came home pointless.

Thornton secretary, John Laing was very praiseworthy of the young Bankies sides performance.

He said: “They played very well especially in the second half and I felt they were unfortunate not to take something from the game.”

Lochee United have clinched the super league championship, which means the Dundonians will play in next season’s Senior Scottish Cup

The Scottish Junior Cup, sponsored by the City Link Bus Group, takes place at Rugby Park, Kilmarnock on Sunday.

The competing clubs are Cumnock and Bathgate Thistle.