After winning 4 matches on the trot we suffered a defeat to Malmesbury, with the final scoreline certainly not showing a fair reflection of the closeness of the match.

The game was played in very cold conditions and our players were not helped in their preparation with our opponents not arriving until a couple of minutes before the scheduled kick off time. We were also without Conor in goal who was ill and Lewis in defence as he was at a birthday party.

We actually started very well for a change and hit the post twice in the first 10 minutes through shots from Euan and had a couple of other good chances to go into the lead.

Then from Malmesbury's very first attack they opened the scoring with a well struck shot beating our stand in keeper Callum and giving them the lead against the run of play.

Things got worse for us as Malmesbury got their 2nd goal when a corner was deflected into the net by one of our players as they attempted to clear it to safety.

Half-Time 0-2

Isaac took over in goal for the 2nd half and Callum quickly showed us what we were missing with him in goal for the first half, when he got us back into the game with a lovely left footed shot after a good run 5 minutes into the half.

The game then became very interesting and closely contested as both defences held firm as the play switched from end to end as both teams went in search of further goals.

Malmesbury then added another goal as we again failed to clear a corner and the ball was poked in from close range to restore their 2 goal lead.

We tried to score more goals and the Malmesbury keeper made a very good save from Callum as we threw players forward, which then led to us conceding a 4th goal on the break close to the end of the game.

The difference on the day between the 2 teams was the quality of the Malmesbury corners which we never came to terms with, as the teams were very equal in open play.

Player of the match: Harrison Russ who as always won his fair share of tackles and had several fine runs in the match.

Credit: Paul Burke
Last modified on Thursday 31st December 2020 at 17:24