Shipyard suffer from early mistakes.
The concession of two early goals had the Shipyard staring defeat in the face before six minutes had elapsed and despite rallying before half-time the damage had been done as hosts Sauchie ran out 5-2 winners at Beechwood Park. Sam Glancy and Rab Kinnaird were unavailable for the trip to Clackmannanshire and they were replaced in the starting eleven by Sandy Strang and Andy Watt. Reece Brown swapped places with Callum McAulay as the latter dropped to the bench.
The Shipyard unfortunately continued a trend of by conceding an early and highly avoidable goal with four minutes on the clock. A free-kick played in from the right-hand side saw the Shippy defence at sixes and sevens and when the ball was headed back across the six-yard box David Cross had the simple task of nodding the ball into the open goal. It was 2-0 within a couple of minutes when possession was lost deep inside the Shipyard half and when the ball was played through to centre forward Ross Crawford, he slotted the ball under Ryan Adamson to leave the Shippy looking at a heavy defeat already. Good build up play saw Watt just fail to make contact when the cross came in and when Jordan Galloway and Watt combined there were no takers at the back post for the former’s fine delivery. The Shipyard fell three behind in the 31st minute after a good piece of skill on the bye line from Conor Langton who cut the ball back for Iain Diack to lash the ball high into the net. Things got worse for the Shippy a few minutes later when again the ball was lost far too easily allowing Crawford to help himself to another goal. Just when it looked like all was lost the Shipyard started to play and in the final three minutes before the interval the deficit was halved. Firstly, Strang gathered the ball following a corner and showed good composure to turn and fire the ball into the net from around ten yards. Good work between Grant Skinner and Robbie Crawford saw a fine cross delivered into the box and Watt was on hand to bullet home his header. Given what had happened in the previous 42 minutes, remarkably, the Shipyard were back in the game albeit with a lot of work still to do.
Adamson denied Crawford his hat-trick as he blocked the big striker’s effort with his legs, however, Crawford did not have to wait long as he got his third goal in the 63rd minute as he beat Adamson at the second attempt after he broke through the centre of the Shipyard defence. Strang saw his header from a McAulay corner blocked and then the Shippy’s Crawford cut in from the left evading a couple of challenges before shooting too straight at Sauchie keeper Darren Dolan. The second half was punctuated with offside decisions as both teams’ attacks were constantly thwarted by the linesman’s raised flag. The Shipyard were reduced to 10 men as substitute McAulay received a second yellow as the game moved into added time. A final opportunity fell to Reece Brown but the youngster blasted over from the corner of the six-yard box.
Sauchie: D. Dolan, S. Houston, S. Dolan, D. Cross, T. Hewitt, M. Sharp, I. Diack (M. Finlayson), D. Taylor, R. Crawford, A. McTaggert (R. Conville), C. Langton (A. McKeown). Unused Subs: D. Cummings & C. Cairney.
Burntisland Shipyard: R. Adamson, Jor. Galloway, G. Skinner, R. O’Donnell, S. Strang, B. Hutchison, R. Brown, R. Lennie, A. Watt, C. Simpson (C. McAulay), R. Crawford (R. Bernard). Unused Subs: P. Bell & R. Connor.
Referee: C. Macrae.