POSTAL ALC V BANCHORY - DIV 1 NORTH - SHEDOCKSLEY - 15th May 2024

TEAM - 1.  G.Cormack  2.  S.Carter  3.  R.Webster  4.  A.Macrae  5.  B.Patterson  6.  A.Clark  7.  E.Brechin  8.  J.Steele  9.  D.Mackenzie  10.  S.Abel  11.   S.Stuart  12.  S.Cotovici  13.  M.Maciver  14.  A.Baxter  15.  S.Walker

OPPOSITION MOTM – S. Abel

Postal, again, had to play this Div1 North Home game at Shedocksley due to Webster Park being unavailable.

Banchory are flying at the moment and looks like they will win the league, so the managers team talk pre-game concentrated on defending a little bit deeper than usual and not leaving too much grass in behind to run onto.

In the 25 minutes from hearing the team talk and starting the game, the Postal defence must have completely forgotten the instruction, or decided to ignore it when they handed Banchory the opener after only 30 seconds, when they lost the ball in midfield then let a ball over the top be picked up by the Banchory left sided forward who ran past Carter like he wasn’t there to deposit the ball into the keeper’s left corner.  0-1

3 minutes later and Postal were two down.  From a Banchory corner, Brechin lost his man who headed goalwards until Cormack saved for another corner.  From the second corner, a Banchory forward made no mistake, heading home unchallenged.  No excuse.  Disgraceful defending.  0-2.

Only 11 minutes into the half and Postal were still all over the place.  The third came when Patterson tried to close down a Banchory forward, running out of this central shape but was too slow to get anywhere near.  The result saw the player send the ball over the top of Webster on the Postal left with the flat Postal defence nowhere to be seen.  The Banchory player cut in from the left and scored.  0-3.

On 20 minutes Postal were awarded a penalty when a Banchory player was judged to have handled in the box.  Steele stepped up to score.  1-3.

For the next 25 minutes, Postal looked a lot better.  Closing the ball down quicker, finding a better line at the back and generally competing, rather than watching the away side play triangles round about them.

Postal should have cored on 30 minutes.  Abel skinned his man down the Postal right, crossed to the waiting Stuart at the back post but he fired wide.

2 minutes before half time and the Banchory goalkeeper gave Postal a gift when he was caught by Mackenzie about 10 yards outside his box.  Having won the ball Mackenzie kept his composure to roll the ball into the net.  2-3.

HALF TIME – Postal ALC 2 – Banchory 3

Postal continued where they had left off towards the end of the first half and were competing well for the opening ten minutes.  Unfortunately they conceded from a corner around this time when Steele tried to clear at the front post but knocked the ball onto the on-running Clark who scored an OG.  2-4.

“Lying down” isn’t a phrase which this Postal team has had labelled against them over the last couple of seasons but that’s exactly what they did after the OG went in.  An absolute shambles of a 30 minutes were to follow.

25 mins into the second half, a ball into the box saw Stuart turned like he wasn’t even there and his man fired into the net past Cormack.  2-5.

A minute later and it was 2-6.  A simple ball over the top of Steele on the Postal left, saw his man run past him to head in unchallenged. 

A minute from the end of the match Patterson was skinned inside his own box on the Postal byeline far too easily.  The cross into the box was knocked home by an unmarked player who could have taken his time if he wanted, given there were no Postal players anywhere near.  2-7.

Final Result – Postal ALC 2 – Banchory 7

Overall, you’re not going to win many games if you only compete for half an hour out of the 90.  Postal showed a complete lack of ability to carry out pre-match instructions tonight.  For an hour, out of the 90 mins, they didn’t compete physically, preferring to ball watch as the team at the top of the league played the ball round about them.  Most frustratingly, though, having gotten themselves back into the game, they then rolled over and walked off the pitch with an embarrassing goals against tally.  An accusation which hasn’t been thrown at them, at all, this season.

Last game of the season on Wednesday night against BSFC.  We’ll see if they have the bottle and more importantly the ability to bounce back.