Temple Of Saints - Bah Humbug

Scottish Premier League - 27/12/99

Scumdee 1 Saints 1 League Table Here

Team : Main,McQ,Bollan,Weir,Danny,Kane,Chief,Del,Nathan Jones,Pope
Subs : Robertson,Keyring,McCluskey,Georgio,Gerry

Oh shit - and other such delightful post-Xmas hangover feelings. After the delights of last week's win and the sense that the tide might be turning in our favour as we produced another first 45 of sexy football, Saints went to sleep in the second half and allowed the Lux-Loathers to grab a late equaliser. Still there is hope.

St. Sandy stuck by the same 16 from last week with Dasovic again losing out. With the Dens Park wasteland covered in ice in the midfield Alan "Shite Decision" Freeland only just gave the go ahead for the match - although at least it gave him a chance to retain his consistency for crap decisions.

About the only decision he got right was in the first minute when he booked Dildo the Scumdee Italian for a later than Xmas in April challenge on Chief which left our cult midfielder needing treatment. He recovered although his contribution to the sexy football was marred by the crap conditions of the pitch and the spoiling talents of the Scumdee arseholes.

Nathan had our first shot on goal after 10 minutes when a header went narrowly wide. Unfortunately he then had to go off for treatment to a head wound after becoming infected with some Scumdee head lice - he returned after 5 minutes. We should have taken the lead 5 minutes later - a Bollan cutback from the left was squared on by Nathan to McQ who let rip with a 20 yard drive past Douglas the MarrShagger only for the ball to hit the crossbar.

By this time we were starting to dominate the game with Del and Pope playing some lovely balls in midfield and Nathan making plenty of room. Pope came close with a header which should have been buried and Jonesy should have had a penalty when he was held in the box. Bollan picked up a yellow for looking at a Scumdee player the wrong way as the game threatened to boil over with new Tink Nicky Banger looking every inch the cheating diver we thought he was. And with Tweed and Ireland in defence it was lucky we still had 11 fit players as the game wore on.

10 minutes before half-time and Scumdee lived up to their shite reputation by missing 3 sitters as the Saints defence went to sleep with Weir lost, Bollan too slow and even Danny failing to clear his lines properly. This was followed by Scotland's No. 1 making a fine save from a tink header. Saints came back though and Nathan set up Pope and Jones on a run but the latter shot instead of passing to the better positioned Pope and Scumdee looked set to survive until half-time.

Except they didn't and on the stroke Nathan got the ball in the 6-yard box before seeing Scabby Douglas save his shot. But he failed to hold the ball and the Ginger Bomber was there to tap in the rebound and send the large (are you watching Retard Scum) travelling support mental.

Second-half was a much more subdued affair for Saints with Scumdee looking the hungrier team and the boys forced to defend a bit deeper. This meant that Jones lack of pace saw only Nathan as the sole danger man up front although he came close with a 25-yard effort across goal. We were struggling in a bogged down midfield though with neither Chief or Del on the wings able to get any crosses in and McQ and Bollan still failing to clear their lines.

65 minutes gone and after a couple of close calls the tinks missed another sitter from 12 yards out. St Sandy made his first substitution with 20 minutes left when Keyring came on for Pope - bit of a strange one since JP still looked to have some running in him, whilst Jones and Chief were both struggling.

Unfortunately he didn't have much effect and with 10 minutes to go the tinks equalised when a cross from the right saw Willie "used to play for TFOE" Falconer out jump a crap Weir and head past Main. After that it was real backs to the wall stuff with Scumdee tearing the midfield apart and leaving McQ and Blaster for dead. With Danny struggling with an ankle knock Weir looked very shaky in defence and it was only thanks to a couple of Main saves that the scores stayed level.

That's not to say we didn't have some chances of our own and when Georgio replaced Jones with 5 minutes left we still managed to get a couple of close shots in which Scotland's no. 3014891 managed to keep out. McQ joined Bollan in the book for a nothing offence as the game wound down.

MoM for me was Nathan - he ran his arse off and was at the heart of most attacks. Unfortunately Jones was pretty disappointing and someone like Georgio or Miguel might have gotten more from the game. Still Pope had another good game in midfield and hopefully when Dasovic is fit they can form a decent partnership. Oh yes and Danny held the Saints defence together...as usual.

Remember to vote on todays ref Alan Freeland - send marks out of 10 to refvote@grange.demon.co.uk or just select a rating and press the button below ::

Saints Index Fixtures Index Grange Index

Any problems / comments mail webmaster@grange.demon.co.uk