After a long lay off due to bad weather, exam commitments and lack of referee availability, the Under 16 boys finally got back in action with a home match at the sports hub against Renfrew High.

The previous meeting resulted in a 4-3 victory for Renfrew with the boys doing well to fight back from 4-0 down on a poor pitch.

A tough match was expected.

However, long lay off or not, the boys came out flying and spent much of the first period camped in the Renfrew half.

It wasn’t long before the first goal arrived courtesy of Greg Steven with a super-cool finish.  Composure in front of goal is perhaps the one area that Greg has been lacking this season, but he would show plenty of composure throughout this game in a sensational individual performance.

With barely 20 minutes gone, Johnstone were 3-0 ahead with a Greg Steven hat trick.  It certainly wasn’t a one man show though with every player in the team on top form, and Cameron Coughtrie emphasised this with an outstanding finish from a free kick from way out to take the score to 4-0 and that man Steven would round out the half with another goal and 5-0 at the break.

The tempo dropped a little in the second half but there was still time for 4 more Johnstone goals, a bizarre own goal involving Johnstone’s usually so reliable Irwin Gray and a truly outstanding save from the same player.

At the end of the game Johnstone had a fantastic 9-1 victory with 6 goals for Greg Steven and excellent strikes from Lewis Banaghan and Dylan Miller.

Not one player played anything less than excellent and hopefully the boys can build on this result in the matches to come.