merchiston 1st Xi 7
belhaven 1st Xi 0
Belhaven turned out for their second football match of the season away to tough opposition in the form of Merchiston one man down due to Geordie Gladwin’s late injury ruling him out of this fixture. Let not the scoreline fool you into thinking that the story of this match was one-way traffic. On the contrary, Belhaven more than held their own for periods of the game and had three good chances to reduce the deficit against Merchy at various stages of the game on a boggy Edinburgh pitch.
In the first half Belhaven had conceded two goals, the first due to an avoidable defensive error, and the second to a slick through ball threaded through the Blues’ defence. In the 18 minute Will Jack showed some dazzling footwork to bamboozle his way through the Merchy defence, leaving three defenders in his wake before rounding the keeper. Unfortunately the angle proved too tight and Jack shot wide from an acute angle on his wrong side. A third goal just before the break was possibly a touch harsh on the visitors.
Reminders were sent ringing into the ears of the defenders at half-time to push up more and stay as a unit. The midfielders were also minded to play the ball with more conviction, to use the wings and not be scared to believe in their own passing ability. The middle of the field had become boggy and the team who used the wings the most effectively would do better in the game. A target of simply winning the second half was set but this soon proved unlikely as within two minutes of the restart, Peter Dalrymple was harshly adjudged to have handled in the area when blocking a cross. One can question the validity of such decisions all day, but that kind of thing will go against you if you defend shots and crosses with your arms aloft.
After a fifth Merchy goal due to hesitant defending, Belhaven created two glorious chances, firstly when some superb close-control from the Rogers twins opened up the home defence and only a last-ditch tackle prevented Belhaven from opening their account. Freddie and Caspar can strike fear into a defender on a good surface as they are tricky and fast and have great link-up play.
Again Belhaven probed in our best period of the game and more super play from Galbraith and Stodart produced a wonderful dribble from Stodart who unfortunately didn’t take his chance to shoot when it arose, and the chance was lost.
By now Belhaven were bossing the midfield and the more we kept the ball high up the pitch, the more Jack, Rogers (both), Stodart and the hard-working Galbraith could try to create openings for the diligent and intelligent runs from Laird. Stodart produced one sublime piece of skill towards the left-hand touchline when he drew in three opposition midfielders before spinning away backwards with the ball seemingly glued to his laces, not a Merchy player within ten yards of him. Added to three free-kicks which he placed right in the danger area, he had a very good game indeed and stepped into Gladwin’s shoes comfortably.
Two late goals flattered Merchy, but the quality of the strikes was top-notch; both super, long-range drives, hard and low into Forsyth’s net leaving the keeper with little chance. Though there was a touch of offside about some of the goals, let that take nothing away from Merchy – they have some very good, skilful attacking players and fully deserved a clear win today.
The boys played well to-day and have taken a big step in their understanding of the game and progression of their skills. The defence was much more solid, marshalled admirably by Barnes and their understanding of the game will only get better. Our attacking play was good and Dougal Forsyth is a very good goalkeeper who improves with every game. We do need to work on moving up as one and pushing further up the field when we are on the attack, and we also need to have more belief in our ability to play the ball longer to clear our lines, or switch play from the centre to the wing to start off another attack. All in all however, the boys played much more solidly and effectively than in the previous game against the same opposition and have made terrific progress this term. Well done.
Squad: Dougal Forsyth, Peter Dalrymple, Douglas Donaldson, Tom Stodart, Tom Galbraith, Freddie Rogers, Will Jack (c), Caspar Rogers, Leo Seymour, Rory Barnes, George Cuthbert, Andrew Watson, Hector Laird, Jamie MacDonald, Tom Dalrymple.
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