Scottish Cup 4th Round - 13/02/99
Scottish Cup 4th Round - 13/02/99 Lacklustre Livvy Lions 1 Sexy Saintees 3
Team ::
Main,McQuillan,Bollan,Dods,Kernaghan,Dasovic,O'Neil,Scott, Kane,Legend,Kid
Goals
Subs :: McMahon,Daniel(!),Eusebio
More
like the sexy Saintees of a few months ago, given the hype of the last
week with Chucky King and Dwarf Robbo going to do another giant-killing
act on us this was an incredibly one-sided match with for a change St
Sandys sexy boys in complete control. On a surface resembling the Sahara
desert (don't they know how much we hate all things Arabesque), St Sandy
gave starting slots to a fit Dasovic and Kid Goals with Gerry the Tube,
Danny and Eusebio dropping to the subs bench.
With a strong wind circulating round the 3-stands and a rather uneven pitch it didn't look to be the best conditions for a flowing game of football. But these are the gloriously sexy Saintees now and with their usual air of unpredictability they set about dismantling a Livvy side which seemed to consist purely of ex-Jambos and Saintees with precision and professionalism much to the delight of the 1800 travelling fans who outsung their hosts for most of the match.
The opening minutes were fairly even as Saints adapted to the bumpy surface and Livvy put Dods (or Forrest Gump as he was christened today - just watch his loping run to see what I mean) and Father Dougal under some pressure. But the midfield was a lot stronger today with Dasovic back to help Kane (although Phizzy still looked like he badly needed a kick up the arse) and up front the holding ability of Legend was a perfect foil for the runs of Nathan and Del. Saints had the first chances with Del and Kane coming close and Kid Goals denied a penalty whilst Legend's height caused the Livvy defence all sorts of problems.
With quarter of an hour gone, Nathan picked the ball up just inside Livvy's half and proceeded to dribble his way past 3 defenders. On a run he kept going past another couple of yellow shirts before letting loose a low shot from the edge of the box which the keeper failed to hold, only to find Chief Poacher Legend waiting to tap in the rebound. After that Saints settled and put a lot more pressure on a plainly shaky defence. Shots from Phizzy, Kernaghan and Del came in along with a narrow-angled drive from Kid Goals that went just wide.
The midfield was in control now and Blaster Bollan and McQ had more room to move forward on the wings. With 5 minutes to go till half-time a Legend header was tipped onto the bar. The rebound came out to the edge of the six-yard box and Phizzy sent a low drive into the net.
This was the cue for some less than sportsmanlike play from the more thuglike Livvy defenders. We had them not playing the ball to a blue shirt when Saints played the ball out after Dods went down with an elbow in the face. Main and Dasovic both ended up in shit with the ref for protesting about the elbow but given that the man in the middle (and I use the word man i the broadest sense of the word) was Stuart Dougal (or Stuart the Saintee Hater as we know him) I suppose we should be lucky that there were still 11 players on the park.
Second-half saw Livvy come at us more but on the hour mark a long ball into the box saw Legend with a mid-air tussle with the Livvy keeper (having a pretty poor day) to send the ball over the line for no. 3. After that we were guilty of sitting back a bit but the defence was easily capable of dealing with Robbo and co's tiring attacks.
St. Sandy sent on the subs towards the end with Del, Dazza and Kid Goals (who deserved a goal for all his work) replaced by Gerry the Tube (who did very little), Danny (or Daniel as he was announced by the Schemies PA) and Eusebio with the latter unlucky not to score. We still had plenty of chances towards the end as Legend was set up a few times for the hat-trick. However his best chance saw the lack of pace show up as he was beaten on the break.
With 5 minutes to go a Livvy corner saw some poor marking in the box (Kane seemed to be to blame) and a Robertson backward header looped over Main to give them a consolation goal.
Overall a much better performance. However, Livvy didn't seem to be the giant-killing Premier team in waiting we all expected. Mind you though when Paul Deas is your left-back what can you expect. MoM for me was Legend - a man who plays for the jersey.
Finally congratulations to Livvy for a good set-up off the park - there were plenty of ideas Saints could take on board - free flags for the kids, some music when we score goals and a livelier announcer for a start.
Remember to vote on todays ref Stuart Dougal (Hell) - send marks out of 10 to refvote@grange.demon.co.uk