New Beechwood Park, East Region SJFA Midland League, 22/2/22
Entrance – Me £6, Wee Man £0
Attendance – 127 (Rough head count)
Pie – N/A
Pint – N/A
Lochee Harp Football Club
Formed – 1904
Nickname – The Harp
Honours – Tayside Premier League – 1983/84, 1984/85, 1985/86, Dundee Junior League – 1904/05, 1906/07, 1910/11, 1922/23, 1923/24, 1926/27, 1928/29, 1929/30, 1930/31, 1931/32, 1934/35, 1935/36, 1937/38, 1948/49, 1949/50, 1953/54, 1954/55, 1958/59, 1960/61, 1962/63
Random Fact – Harp have a celebrity fan in their ranks, as media man and all round good dude, Jim Spence has been heard to mention his allegiance on Sportsound now and then.
After visiting here earlier in the season I really didn’t think I would be back so soon or ever if truth told. But with our original plans falling to the weather and Wee Mans insatiable appetite for fitba it was the closest game, it gave Wee Man a new ground and was an early kick off. To add to this I knew there is a huge expanse of grass behind one of the goals for a kick about. To be honest, I wish we didn’t go as I take no pleasure in what we saw unfold tonight.
The Harp have problems due to managers going and players following suit. This leaving the club to field extremely young players lacking experience, street wise and just general savvy. It really is a shame for this old club and to face off against the team second in the league with an poorer goal difference than leaders East Craigie was a recipe for disaster and it was a bloody disaster thats for sure.
The first half started with the Gowfers almost walking the ball into the net from kick off within seconds. It was a sign of things to come. As were the amount of chances created in the first few minutes. All of which were stopped by the Harp keeper Joe Flynn. On the keeper I will say now he was bloody excellent despite the score. 17 years old and easily ten brilliant saves of all types, he has a good future ahead of him. He was beaten for the first time on the night by Dale Reid who was on hand to finish off a great team move from close range. Panmure were again kept out by some excellent goal keeping with two more superb saves, especially a save from a header off a corner. Then from another corner Ryan Suttie knelt down to tie his lace and no Harp player marked him twenty five yards up. He stood up, called for the ball and recieved it to bend a stunning effort across the goal into the “postage stamp”. Another three great saves came from Flynn followed, two at one on ones and one where he denied the striker from point black range at his near post. A third goal did come on half an hour when Connor Coupe struck a sweet curling effort into the bottom left from around twenty yards. It was game over and was almost worse immediately when Panmure rattled the bar. The fourth wasnt long in coming when Reid knocked in a cross from the right. A very poor goal to concede as no Harp player had the thought to mark the short throw which led to the cross. The same man then completed his hat-trick late on in the half with a header and the Gowfers were not finished and Dignal struck home after walking through the defence and dispensing the ball from around five yards. HT came and thinking back to how many saves were made by Flynn, this could have been well into double figures by forty five minutes.
HT 0 v 6
Half time saw us play a new game. “Shooting shibobos” as it was christened. (Shibobo is a South African word for nutmeg) Basically one stands with their legs open twenty to thirty yards away from the shooter. You are not allowed to move and the shooter has to nutmeg you from range, then swap. With the grass being so bobby and rutted it made the game a challenge. Highly enjoyable fifteen minutes devised by Wee Man. 3 v 3 it finished. Harp on the other hand were not to enjoy what was coming. As the Carnoustie keeper came over to the goal for the second half I had a blether with him and he said they need to up their goal difference so will continue to go for it and thats what they did. The game descended into a farce. The Gowfers had mastered how to get at the Harp. It was a simple strategy of get it wide and get it into the box and it was constant and relentless. Harp did not have a clue how to deal with it and their frailties were continuously exposed. But again there were some more decent stops from the keeper before the net was bulged for the first time of the half. The tip over the bar from ex Don Jamie Winter being the best. But the seventh came from you guessed it a tap in from a cross for Dignan. The post was rattled before the eighth was stuck home. A cross and a header from Roche. Dignan then became the second man to grab a hat-trick. With twenty still to play it was double figures when Dale Reid got his fourth of the night. 11 came a minute later from a Flynn error as he let Reid’s fifth squirm under him. But this cant be held against him after his performance. Then a minute after that it was 12 when Coupe score from close range off a cross. Panmure took a few minutes off and didn’t score again for around another ten minutes until Reid grabbed his double hat-trick in similar fashion to a few of his other five. Two new names appeared on the score sheet for the fourteenth and fifteenth and the were Gordon MacDonald and Pat Martin respectively and that was the end of this strange night.
15 goals is not something we will see a many times if ever again, and the keeper Jo Flynn who conceded the 15 being excellent throughout barring the eleventh just seems to be a weird scenario. The visiting keeper told us Carnoustie would show no mercy at the start of the second half. Clearly this was the instructions of manger Phil Maguire(ex Don). They now sit three point and three goals behind the Shipbuilders, East Craigie on the same games(27) so the manager is doing his job right. Tonight had to be done and who could blame them. It was just a bit of a mockery of a game of fitba to the punters, well to this one anyway. Scuddings of that nature are not for me at all.
Me still 222, Wee Man 96
FITBAWBAG 