Rose and Thistle  2 v 1 Faulkner Arms        (Division 3 League Match)

After last weeks defeat this game was by far the biggest of the season, a win would keep us in the hot seat, a defeat, well kiss goodbye to div2 next year. Faulkner gave us a good game earlier in the season and I’m surprised they were 3rd from bottom.

A near full squad, only Lindley missing due to skiing. The Team was - Conetta, Oakey, Leach, Gray, Marsden, Bunce, Marshall, Waygood, Holman, Gadsen, Milburn Subs - Winnard, Davison, Goacher, Harris, Scales, Trigger. Harris replaced for this game with the manager going for a 451 formation.

1st Half - Thistle looked .even more slow than usual with the team being very quiet. We chose to kick against the wind and knew we had a tough 1st half but the effort seemed to be lacking. From the outset Faulkner seemed the team in second and we looked like the 3rd from bottom team. Perhaps the choice of team wasn’t correct but then that’s the managers fault. True to current form Thistle found themselves 1-0 down after some slack marking allowed the visitors to go ahead. Thistle had some chances but not clear cut enough to trouble the keeper. Then disaster struck again, not closing down at the edge of the box allowed a fairly tame shot to sneak past the keeper into the bottom corner. 2-0 Faulkner. Thankfully the ref blew for half time, a shocking display considering just how important this game is to us.

Half time a change took place, Marshall off and Harris on. Harris going into the middle and Bunce off to the right. Dan’s form has dropped off of late and confidence an all time low.

2nd Half - In this half it looked better and Thistle realizing just what was at stake decided to pick up the pace, shame that attitude wasn’t there from the 1st min. It took a while for the right through ball to come from Holman and who else but shinner to whack home, 2-1 Faulkner. The game huffed and puffed to a predictable conclusion with the ever improving Oakey taking control of the back line. So a defeat, and our chances of promotion lost in apathetic play of the past two games. One might even suspect that some of the lads talk a good game about promotion but don’t actually want it, some might say that.

All in all a real shame considering the hard work of this season but on the positive side this is a lesson that we can all take with us and ensure it doesn’t get repeated.

M.O.M - Waygood, battled to get going and scored the goal that could have sparked a revival.