Elgin City 3 v 2 Albion Rovers

Attendance : 310

Scorers ~ Elgin City : Shallicker (85, 88), Kaczan (90). Albion Rovers : Wright (37), Benton (46).

It was a case of Déjà Vu at Borough Briggs for the small band of travelling Albion Rovers fans when for the second match in a row they contrived to lose a match from a 2-0 lead in the last few minutes of the game.

The first action of the match was Mr. McLean showing a yellow card to Mark Nicolson of City for a two-footed tackle. Then Hugh Dickson had a wild shot well over the Rovers crossbar. Rovers first attempt on goal came in 9 minutes when Brian Smith had a cross cum shot miss the target by a narrow margin.

Craig Frizzell was then yellow carded for a theatrical dive in the Rovers penalty area. An Elgin corner led to another unproductive one when Zander Sutherlands shot was deflected.

In 18 minutes an incident in the Elgin goalmouth saw Iain Chisholm put the ball in the net but for some baffling reason the referee didn't give the goal. Being let off the hook gave the home side a boost and Mark Smith had a shot blocked by Chisholm. Shortly afterwards his colleague Darren Shallicker received the ball in Rovers box and immediately fired an overhead kick inches wide of the target.

Craig Campbell then had an attempt which would have been better suited to the rugby world cup. A Shallicker free-kick was stopped but not caught by David Scott leading to David Ross shooting and Ciaran Donnelly clearing the ball off the goal line.

In 37 minutes a Jamie McKenzie through ball found Kenny Wright who beat David Hind and hit a sweet ball from the edge of the box giving Ali Ridgers no chance, and putting Rovers ahead.

A Callan Adam cross into the City box was cut out by Ridgers followed by McKenzie being downed and Donnelly hitting the resulting free-kick over from 30 yards.

Half-Time

The second period had hardly got going before Rovers were two up when Alan Benton hit a screamer from 35 yards over the head of the 'keeper. Kenny Wright tried for a third with a lob from the corner of the Elgin box but it wasn't accurate enough.

Dickson shot straight to Scott before Rovers were briefly encamped in the homesters penalty area, nobody managed a shot until the ball came out to McKenzie whose attempt had too much elevation.

A "handbags" incident saw at least one booking - despite there being several men involved in the stooshie. Back to play and a brilliant tackle by Benton on Shallicker prevented an imminent shot despite Elgin claims for a free-kick. Elgin were steadily gaining control of the play now having shot after shot blocked by the hard-working Rovers defence.

Shallicker came close with a 30 yards free-kick followed by substitutions by both sides. An Elgin corner to Dickson on the far post was squandered. 

In 79 minutes a high ball from Frizzell made Scott pull off a quality stop then poor defensive play by the Coatbridge men allowed Sutherland to shoot, it skimmed past the post on the way out.

In 85 minutes the inevitable happened when Shallicker had an easy tap-in from a Martin Charlesworth ball which found him in the clear in front of goal. Donnelly and Charlesworth received yellow cards from the referee when the former seemed to delay the balls return.

Oddly Rovers gaffer John McCormack decided at this point to bring off McKenzie and replace him with Graeme Watson. A couple of minutes later that man Shallicker levelled the score with a free-kick. On the 90 minute mark Shallicker had the ball in the net once more but Mr. McLean had blown for an infringement half a second before it crossed the line.

A time sapping substitution by Rovers of John McGeough for Adam preceded a Kenny Wright shot which was saved by Ridgers.

Deep into injury time a Sutherland corner gave Paul Kaczan a relatively simple header to win the match.

Summary

A simply shocking collapse at the end of a match for the second time in a row. Although they didn't look comfortable whilst leading 2-0 surely Rovers should have weathered the storm better against a team with zero points from 5 previous league games this season.

Elgin City : Ridgers, Campbell, Nicolson (O'Donoghue 65), Hind, Dickson (Kaczan 75), Gilbert, Sutherland, Smith, Shallicker, Ross (Charlesworth 65), Frizzell. Subs Not Used : Lewis, Dunn.

Albion Rovers : Scott, Robert Walker, McGowan, Donnelly, Benton, Donald (Reid 65), Smith, McKenzie (Watson 85), Chisholm, Adam (McGeough 90), Wright. Subs Not Used : Patrick Walker, McLenaghan.

Referee : Steven McLean

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