Game of Two Halves
Vs Thistle 18 July ILT Turf
Old Boys 2 – Thistle 0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbQ09jiphps
Five matches into the season and the record of 2 wins 3 losses wasn’t quite where we expected to be. This week we traveled to the Turf to play Thistle who we beat 2-1 in the first round.
For this match the coaches decided to revert to a 4-man back line while James Tucker got his starting debut for the season in a lone striker role.
Game started in sunny conditions and Old Boys got into their work early with Brody creating havoc out on the right edge. Jose, Laurent and James were also all combining well and created several half chances. Unfortunately, none of them hitting the back of the net with their keeper making a couple of handy saves to boot.
30 mins in and Brody was on hand to put away a loose ball that had been half saved by the keeper. A deserved one but a fragile one at that as from nowhere Thistle created a good chance of their own with Terry making a strong save.
Into halftime at 1-0 the guys were feeling positive and the only niggling feeling was that we should have scored more. Coach Reuben asked for more from the team in terms of lifting the effort and putting them to the sword.
What we got was the opposite with Old Boys spending large periods of the second stanza defending desperately and a litany of mistakes costing possession and territory.
One bright spot came on the counter with Taisei and Laurent combining well out wide before James finished from a great cross to double the lead.
After this the game was more comfortable for the men in red as they improved to 3-3 for the season.
Brody took Player of the Day honours for his efforts in the first half. On Tuesday night the guys are in action again against Gore.
