On the 26th March 2015 Netherlee primary football team faced off against Giffnock Primary at Woodfarm High School.
The match started off well for Netherlee who put lots of pressure on the Giffnock defense and we were unlucky not to score but the Netherlee defense gave the ball away and were too high up the pitch and this led to Giffnock scoring a goal to make it 1-0.
Netherlee kept their heads up and soon afterwards got a goal back through a through ball and a nice finish from Shay O’Dowd to make it 1-1, Assisted by Stephen Alpine.
Netherlee had what seemed like easy control of this match but with the defense again pushing too high up the field Giffnock were able to get a chipped ball over the top and their striker found the net again to make it 2-1.
At the end of the first half Kerr Mackie went up front and hit the woodwork twice with two unlucky shots.
Some nice passing from our team led to the ball being played by Ben Galloway through to Daniel Gear who played and unselfish pass to Shay O’Dowd who equalised just before half-time.
Early second half was dominated by our team with Giffnock making some excellent saves from strong shots by Daniel Gear, Stephen Alpine and Shay O’Dowd but a stray throw in from us was intercepted by our opponents and they clinically finished to make the score 3-2 to Giffnock. Things looked bad for Netherlee.
With around 8 minutes left Euan Menzies ran through from the left-back position to control Stephen Alpine’s throw in. His thunderous shot deflected by a Giffnock defender and the ball flew into the back of the net.
In the late moments of the game Ben Galloway made an overlapping run and from a tough angle put Netherlee up for the first time that day, assisted by Kerr Mackie.
Sadly not for long as with 2mins left Giffnock equalised through a defensive mistake it looked as If Netherlee would have to settle for a draw.
However with 30 seconds left Daniel Gear played a brilliant pass to Kerr Mackie who cut inside on his weaker foot and smashed the ball into the far bottom corner to seal a last minute win for Netherlee making the final score 5-4 to Netherlee. Overall Netherlee deserved the win and it was a great performance for their first game together.
By Euan Menzies, Sean Miller, Stephen Alpine, Findlay McKenzie & Kerr Mackie
