Junior football: Blairgowrie move out of the drop zone

Dec 15 2009

THE weather proved to be the main winner on Saturday as frost bound pitches caused the cancellation of four games.

The Kinnoull and Coupar Angus games were casualties but they got together and played a friendly on the McDiarmid Park all weather pitch.

Blairgowrie produced a top class performance in their away premier league game against Montrose Roselea, thrashing their hosts 5–0 at Broomfield Park and while Roselea are at the bottom of the table this is their heftiest defeat of the season.

This win has lifted Blair out of the leagues drop zone into a near mid table position.

The opening exchanges in this game were pretty even steven and then in the 12th minute a through ball sent Blair’s striker Alan Cruickshank careering towards his opponents goal and from the edge of their penalty he fired in a wicked strike that the keeper saved but the ball broke away from him and rebounded to Jamie Duncan who was following up and he promptly hit it into the back of the net from six yards and Blair were ahead.

As one would expect Roselea responded immediately to this set back with a counter attack that came near to producing the equaliser when one of their forwards let go a shot from just inside the penalty box and looked to be net bound but a timely intervention from defender Craig Ferguson cleared the danger.

There continued to be not a lot between the teams although Blair always looked the more dangerous and in the space of four minutes this proved to be so when they scored twice in the 39th and 43rd minutes.

Darren Neave got the first of those goals when he picked up a clearance out of the Roselea goal on the edge of their penalty box and crashed a shot into the bottom left hand corner of their net and it was 2–0.

Roselea hadn’t recovered from this set back when they suddenly found themselves 3–0 behind. Alan Cruickshank was the scorer this time when he met with a cross from Ryan Menzies and hit the ball past the keeper from close range.

There was an incident involving players of both teams in the tunnel as they went off for the break which resulted in Blair’s Jamie Duncan and Roselea’s Steve Kerrigan receiving red cards.

Roselea strived hard to get back into the game from the restart of the second half and in the 52nd minute they had strong claims for a penalty turned down, which they were none too happy about. They continued to pressurise the Blair defence but they never really troubled the keeper.

Blair, after this spell on the back foot, returned to the attack and in 75 minutes they increased their lead to 4–0. A cross into the Roselea penalty box was met by Mark Brash and his strong header from 12 yards beat the keeper.

Ten minutes later Alan Cruickshank put the icing on the cake for Blair when he fired home a cross from Gary Axworthy to make it a nap hand.

Bankfoot were away to Lochore Welfare and they found themselves a goal behind after 16 minutes. A corner from the Fifers’ right wing eluded the Bankies defence and was met by Craig Patterson at the back post from where he duly dispatched the ball into the back of the net.

Bankies shrugged off this setback and within a matter of minutes they were back on level terms.

Mike Lindsay picked up the ball in his own half and played a long pass through to Barry Ward who squared it across the goal to Gavin Mackie. Gavin obviously noted the keeper was off his goal line and proceeded to beat him with a deft chip  for what was a well worked and taken goal.

Bankies were now doing most of the attacking and in 35 minutes it was no great surprise when they took the lead. A through ball from Colin Fraser to Barry

Ward saw Barry for a second time cut the ball back into the heart of the Fifers penalty box where it was met by Ross Mitchell who slammed it into the back of the net from eight yards and the Bankies were ahead at the interval.

The Fifers strived hard to get back on level terms in the second half but they couldn’t break down the Bankies defence who had performed so admirably.

Then suddenly they found themselves reduced to 10 men when one of their key defenders, Donald McDonald, was red carded after picking up a second caution and four minutes later the game was all square.

The game had gone on for four more minutes and the Bankies were still trying to settle down after being reduced to 10 men when the Fifers grabbed the equaliser. A through ball from Craig Reynolds to Greig Sinclair beat the Bankies offside trap, or at least that’s how the referee saw it and Sinclair ran through to score.

In the few minutes that were left Bankies threw everything into chasing the winner and they won two free kicks which were both taken by Gavin Mackie.

The first rebounded off the post to Barry Ward who hit it into the side net from a tight angle, Gavin hit the second one over the wall but it caught the top of the bar and went over and Bankies had to be satisfied with what was a well deserved share of the points.

Scone Thistle were away to strong going Kirkcaldy YM and the Thistle for much of the first half were on the defensive but they held their opponents in check and their sporadic counter attacks created problems but unfortunately produced no goals. When the interval arrived the score sheet was still blank.

The YM sailed into the attack from the restart and within five minutes they had taken the lead. They won a corner on the right which was fired into the heart of the Thistle penalty box and their striker Craig Ness rose unchallenged to head the ball into the corner of the net.

Thistle strived hard to get back into the game but when Ruairidh McQeen bundled the ball over the line in a goalmouth scramble to make it 2–0 for the YM in the 72nd minute it really was game set and match for the Fifers.

Kinnoull in their friendly with Coupar Angus were 4–0 ahead at the interval. Garry Sweeney netted a double with Martin Maher and Mark Duigan the other scorers. Mark Morrison was their second half goal scorer to make it 5–0 and complete the scoring.

Coupar played a lot of nice football but their finishing lacked punch.

SATURDAY’S results in the  Bukta Teamwear.com Leagues:

Premier League – Montrose Roselea 0, Blairgowrie 5.

Central  League – Lochore Welfare 2, Bankfoot 2; Kirkcaldy YM 2, Scone Thistle 0.

Friendly – Kinnoull 5, Co Angus 0.

Games called off – Jeanfield Swifts v Dundonald Bluebell; Luncarty v Crossgates Primrose; Armadale v Kinnoull; Co Angus v Arbroath SC.