Brechin City 3 Keith 1: Maroons battle in defeat to table-toppers
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ON paper, Keith should have been swept aside at Glebe Park in midweek – but the battling Maroons gave a good account of themselves in Wednesday's 3-1 loss.
Table toppers Brechin City had played 11 league games, winning 10 and drawing one, scoring 30 goals and conceding a miserly four goals.
The Maroons were 13 places below them and had also played 11 games, winning two, drawing two and losing seven, scoring 14 goals and conceding 18 goals.
A no-brainer you might say, especially with Brechin having new manager Gavin Price in charge for the first time.
For a large chunk of the first half, Keith struggled to cope with the homesters’ searing pace, incisive play and direct attitude.
However, once they got to grips they made a fist of it, and although City won comfortably enough, they knew they’d been in a game.
The first 20 minutes saw all four goals being netted, with the spectators left gasping.
A rout looked on the cards after only four minutes when Fraser MacLeod whipped home a low drive from out on the right side of the penalty area. Keith rallied and five minutes later Connor Killoh clipped the ball into Matty Tough’s path and the red-headed number 10 clinically slammed a low drive beyond the goalie for his first goal of the season.
It was all square for less than a minute, when Marc Scott converted amidst a goalmouth melee. Then, hot shot Grady McGrath blasted an unstoppable 18 yarder into the roof of the net. Craig Reid pulled off a couple of fine saves to keep the scoreline the same in the first half.
It was blackout time around Glebe Park in the 53rd minute when the hedge side's floodlights failed, but after over 10 minutes of inactivity it was lights on and game on!
Keith were putting on a brave second half display and after forcing four successive corners Kieran Yeats had the ball in the back of the net with 62 minutes played, but was adjudged to have handled the ball.
Yes, it ended in another defeat for the Maroons, but the starting 11 and the subsequent three substitutes had a never-say-die attitude, that sadly gleaned no points.
KEITH: Reid, Addison, Cheyne, Coull, Robertson, Yeats (Lynch 68), Killoh, Smith (Morrison 60), Cooper, Tough (Taylor 71), McKeown.
