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A rare treat this afternoon when we had the luxury of 3 men in reserve for our North of Scotland Cup Tie against Hayloft. Marlow and England were left out of last weeks eleven and were joined on the bench by Andy Brechin a Halli ‘leg-end’. He was up on a short break from working down south and pulled on the famous colours once again. Andrews was in goal behind Sim, Fulton, Michie and N.Milne. In midfield we had Keith, C.Robertson, E.Milne and Morgan with Westland paired up front with Anderson. We started very well and right from the whistle we took the game to the visitors. We were playing some excellent football but in 24 mins. fell behind against the run of play. A right sided cross in should have been cleared by Fulton who instead tried to play his way out…………"Remember last weeks match Graeme". The ball was nicked off him and fired home. We were level inside 60 seconds when a great move between E.Milne and Keith resulted in a low cross being superbly turned in by Westland. We continued to create and were on top however the match reached half time level(H.T.1-1). Again we stormed into the match although Andrews did have to look lively in 50 mins to take down a dangerous cross. We then took the lead with a quite spectacular goal. Morgan robbed a Hayloft midfielder on the half way line and drove forward he looked up and then produced a sublime finish when he rifled a chip shot over the keeper from 40 yards. Moments later Westland should have increased our lead but his effort floated agonisingly past the post. E.Milne was then unlucky when he struck a post before Westland made up for his earlier miss by grabbing his second, his third goal in only two matches. He took a ball down ten yards out and smashed it into the net. Hayloft grabbed a lifeline when they scored following a short corner, poor defending on our part. The score was then levelled as we yet again aided the visitors. A cross into our area was missed in the air by Keith setting up a chance for Hayloft and Andrews was given no chance. As time ran out Anderson popped up to produce his one and only contribution to the game when he sent away Robertson with a good reverse pass. England was by now on for Westland and Brechin then took over from an ineffectual Anderson(F.T.3-3) A bad last 15 had cost us the tie and extra time started badly for us when Sim gave away a penalty inside 60 seconds. Andrews given no chance. We had 29 mins. to pull it back but we were tiring all over the park. Hayloft then had what appeared to be a perfectly good goal chalked off when a corner was headed strongly into our net. We could not capitalise on this bit of good fortune and turned for the last 15mins a goal behind.(ETHT3-4)At the start of the last period Hayloft won a succession of corners none of which we ever looked comfortable with, however we did get them clear. We continued to huff and puff but only produced one clear scoring opportunity which fell to the feet of Keith. The skipper on this occasion could not produce the goods and instead tamely tapped a weak left foot poke back to the grateful goalkeeper. We won a corner on the left which was well delivered by Brechin. E.Milne was unlucky not to connect as he threw himself at the ball. (E.T.F.T.3-4). A bad result considering we had been 2 goals up. Amazingly today’s was our 5^th consecutive draw after 90 minutes of play. One aspect of today’s and many of the previous games we have played recently is the fact that too many players are arriving for the match far to close to the kick off time. We must put more effort into getting there earlier and giving ourselves and team mates a better chance of preparing for the game instead of being unsure of who is going to be playing where or who is going to be rushing on at the last minute. Hallitopman this afternoon goes to Westland in only his 4th appearance for the club. He is looking better and better with every game and his workrate was once again excellent.