EAST FIFE FANS VIEWS (from P&B)
Mon the Fife: What a fantastic result! The referee (I use that term loosely) will be crying into his kippers tonight.
With the crap weather it was never going to be a good game and when Scotty Morrison decided to let a Dougie Cameron cross go over him for 1-0 it looked like it was going to be a game of calamity. As it was.
A few minutes later Willie failed to deal with a low cross and spilled it to to Mcgowan for 1-1. McManus made it 2-1 with a great volley that Morrison could only palm into the net. Then a minute later came another farce. A long punt up the park wasn't dealt with by Tweed, and with McCulloch already half way out his goal it left an empty net for 2-2. Tweed and McCulloch then decided to have a 'head to head' over the incident. Handbags were flying.
Fozzy was then sent off for apparantly holding back Mcgowan I think for being last man. They were miles away from goal and so to was the ball. Anyway off he went for farce no 1. Farce no 2 arrived shortly after when Fagan was sent packing for an elbow. Again only the referee could see this.
Arbroath were powder puff in attack and with the superstar Chris Templeman playing as a centre half they were never going to score. A few minutes left to go a corner comes in, Llyod Young hits the bar and Stevie Tweed knocks the ball in.
Superb from all the players who never gave up. Division 3 beckons for Arbroath.
Liam A: Spoke to some of the players after the game; Bibby was sent off not for a foul but fo 'showing intent to stop a goalscoring oportinuty' Fagan was sent off for punching an Arbroath player, McMullan I think. McMullan pleaded Fagan's innocence to the ref , he turned & caught Fagan's shoulder in the face.
Arbroath were a huge disappointment in the 2nd half (not that I'm complaining!) even against 9 men they still played 4 across the back against only McManus.
A huge 3 points for us but I don't know if we have enough players left for next week.
GordonEF: I have to say, Arbroath were horrendously cautious for a team playing against 9 men. They kept a back 4 and a defensive midfielder all the way through. The longer the game went on I was thinking, "fucking hell, we're going to get a point out of this" and the fact that we kept going and got all 3 is a real testament to the players and Dave Baikie. That was one of ththe most exciting games I've been to in ages
ARBROATH FANS
Farflung Lichtie: The manager was talking about the need to be brave and strong after last week. The players lacked a cutting edge, tried too many passes and paid for it. The manager showed too much caution in leaving the subs until too late - and perhaps not pushing forward when they had an advantage
I STILL back McGlashan but was sorely tried second half. First half, 11 versus 11, I thought we were the better team against an East Fife team that has better players across the side (a forward line of Linn, Crawford and Templeman) - thanks to Mr Gray. We passed the ball around well and carved out quite a few chances (our saviour Wullie McC coming to the rescue).
Not for the first time, we lost it psychologically after the second sending off - at that point I suspected what was coming. Far too cautious from management and players. OK E Fife were really galvanised (thanks to Mr Gray - a wee joke) and we lacked the craft to open them up as they sat back, as they had to. But we didn;t see that many balls into the box, or Raeside coming forward to augment the attack - it suddenly became a poor training exercise to try to pass our way around them.
I have serious questions about the team and the manager after yet another failing of nerve. If we've scored these missed penalties and not crumpled late, we could be in a much healthier position - that the football for 80 minutes (or 40 yesterday) deserved.
As for changing managers, Alex Ferguson mentioned on TV yesterday that there is absolutely no evidence, in fact much to the contrary, that this ever improves the situation. I still see some positives from the team and better play compared with last season when we were dire
Blazes Boylan : Fortune favours the brave.
Templeman went up in my estimations as he played in the back 3 (4?) and maintained a huge grin as he got away with it for the entire second half, high-fiving Seven Tweed every time he hoofed it out (drawing derisory cheers from our support who failed to realise that this was precisely his remit) and kept his head above water. His man of the match award was both hilarious and curiously edifying in the fog of misery that was our abysmal sporting impotence.
Our team looked not so bad and were carving out chances until the baying idiots of our support forced McGlashan to throw on a chronically underprepared Scott and the thereafter underused Scot Gates. Well done.
I'm hurting too and feel errors were made, but while McGlashan may not be the "messiah" at least he is not a half-witted reactionary cretin: why come along?
Forward to next week in the inevitable relegation battle.
SimonLichtie: The ref couldnt have given us THAT much more help in winning that game for starters, I cant understand any AFC fan complaining about the ref! Both sendings offs were shockers IMO.
I have NEVER felt so disgusted and angered at leaving a football match as I did this afternoon. I've seen some utter shite performances in my years as an AFC fan, but that takes the piss. The tactics John has used in the last few games in the 2nd half have been an absolute embarrassment. Alloa last week was a total shocker after being in such control, and if John had made basic tactical changes correctly I feel that game would have gone our way. Today was the same 2nd half pish.
What does John say to the players at half time of each game? Every 2nd half performance we seem to put in is unbelievably shite. Tactically, I feel John is the worst manager in the SFL. It'd prefer to see the players nip off for a pint at HT, im sure it would do them better than listening to whatever John is telling them. In the last 2 games, Alan Maitland and Dave Baikie have tactically outclassed him far to easily. I do believe we have the players to stay in this division, but not the manager.
Finally - has any Arbroath fan EVER seen an AFC away support that angered and disgusted at full time? Personally, I have never shouted abuse at an Arbroath manager before today, and I have never been so livid and filled up with abuse towards the team and manager at full time. Absolutely disgusted with the last 2 weeks, i'm afraid its the end of the line John.
1320Lichtie: Atrocious , we could have fekkin tonked them if we made the subbies early. John is truly awful and needs to go, I dont know what he's playing at, well done to East Fife though when they were under pressure for much of the 2nd half they pulled through and got a good result. Steven Weirs goal was a cracker though and he had a good game today, so did McGowan, but then John takes him off i mean wtf.
So any ideas on who the manager will be for Ayr next saturday ?