Plean 0 – Spartans 1

East of Scotland Cup Round 3

A long range strike from Michael Moffat sealed Spartans place in the last 16 of the Bathroom Planet East of Scotland Cup. In a game that Spartans once again failed to take their chances in front of goal.

Spartans dominated the first half without troubling the Plean keeper on too many occasions, Looking dangerous on the break it looked like it would be a comfortable progression to the last 16 but a plucky Plean side refused to go down easily. Spartans should have opened their account when Moffat was set free on a quick counter attack. He outpaced the sweeper who tried to pull him down and had he succeeded would have seen red. Moffat managed to hit the keeper legs with Gary Bannon standing with an open net beside him. Scott was next to test the keeper with a bullet header and the Plean No 1 did well to tip over.

The second half started in similar fashion as Spartans held the bulk of the possession but failed to convert their early chances. Plean did play better in the second half but there were very few clear cut chances before Spartans scored what turned out to be the winning goal. Moffat, the earlier culprit saw the keeper off his line and struck a fine yet deceptively slow moving 25 yarder. The keeper who had done well up until the point looked as though his attention was diverted waving at a local friend on his way to convert his Post Office vouchers into Tennants Super and Rizla. To the delight of the travelling Spartans army, the visitors were now ahead.

Spartans should have kicked on from here and Moffat managed to fail to convert a Bannon Cut back, Mitchell hit arguably the worse shot of the season (so bad the ref awarded a corner), Scott had a long range effort comfortably saved and Reid (described by the Plean faithful as a Posh Irishman) had an effort palmed over the bar. 

In an effort to finish the growing number of chances Lamb brought on Perry and Forbes. Perry, with his white boots and powder puff challenges made little impact. Forbes managed to get in behind the back four and with Reid standing with an open net decided to play for a corner off the keeper’s legs rather than wrap up the win.

Plean did have a long range effort sail over the bar and a goal mouth scrmable was punted clear by Steele in the dying minutes. Overall, on a bumpy pitch Spartans proceeded to the next round. The defence was strong, Bannon who ‘failed to sprinkle his magic dust’ always a good outlet for him to run the ball out of the pitch or into a defender and Sam Scott was given the green light to impersonate a headless chicken in the middle (left, right, upfront and in front of the abck four).

The win was soured by the news that a 50-50 contested by Jim Rae left a Plean player with a fractured ankle and ligament damage and the club wish him a speedy recovery. On top of this the 2′s have followed in the illustrious footsteps of the 1′s leaving the sub suits in Plean which Sutherland has kindly offered to pick up this week (as he may need one on Sat!)

Next up is Liberton AVU in the last 16 on Saturday

Team: Paterek, Burns, Sutherland, Steele, Rae, Bannon (Forbes), Mitchell (Perry), Scott, Boyes, Moffat (Douglas), Reid

Subs not used: Zuk

MOM: tough call – possibly Steele or Sutherland for keeping the shots to a minimum