Huntly 14's v Byron Athletic

Today we had the luxury of another home match, this time Byron Athletic came calling at the Meadows Huntly on league business. As i sat down in the afternoon to watch my second team (Rangers) in action i coudn't help but draw comparisons between the two matches. We like Walter and co. had to make do without our regular goalkeeper and influential midfielder due to injury's (along with three others from our squad),but a great deal of credit goes to their replacements who were outstanding today.
We started the match well enough with Andrew Munro pushed up front to add pace to the forward line and he proved a constant thorn in Byrons side all day long but for some reason we were again guilty for giving the opposition to much respect as they started to push us onto the back foot with their tall striker causing us all sorts of problems, and we had stand-in goalkeeper Matthew Anderson to thank with some superb stops and rushing of his line to clear any danger, but however Byron did eventually breach our goal in 15mins, with Ritchie Gibb off the field receiving treatment for an injury, we got caught out as they got behind our defence and a simple lob over Matthews head to finish made it 0-1. As normal we seem to find our selves a goal down before we realise how good we can be also and it took us most of the first half to recover, first a great left foot cross into the box by Jonny Buist was met by Ritchie Gibb who finished superbly firing low past the keeper to level 1-1. Then with just minutes left before the break a brilliant in swinging corner again from the left foot of Jonny Buist was met by Jack Duncan who's shot rebounded for James Brooks to finish, H-T 2-1.
Second half with the wind at our backs our lads took complete control of the match but continued to miss chance after chance before a good cross, again from the left was met superbly on the volley by James Brooks who rifled home the goal of the match, 3-1. Billy Blanchard was next on the score sheet for us when he broke through the Byron defence ,and with his first attempt coming back off the post he made no mistake with the rebound, 4-1. Credit to Byron though who were not a dirty team and they broke up field to score a good goal of their own when a good passing move was finished well, 4-2. Our lads were still not finished though and was determined not to let Byron back into the match, Lee Inglis rattled the crossbar with a shot from a corner before James Brooks was sent clear and his sublime finish low past the keeper put the icing on the cake for us and completed his hatrick 5-2.
So like Rangers we ground out a good result without producing anywhere near our best performance football wise but overall another good three points on the board despite missing so many chances which on another day we may live to regret.
Man of the match, well there were a few close contenders, Matthew Anderson had a superb match in goals with a string of excellent stops and commanding his area well both on the deck and in the air. Andrew Munro who played well up front and caused Byron endless problems with his pace. Liam Henderson we thought had another good steady match in midfield and of course hatrick hero James Brooks whose second goal was spectacular to say the least ,but for providing an endless amount of chances through his craft and creativity eventually setting up three of our five goals Jonny Buist just shaded it ,as we look forward to him becoming a big player for us. WELL DONE LADS!
Todays team:- 1/Matthew Anderson 2/ Ritchie Gibb 3/ Muir Gregor 4/ Jack Duncan 5/ Lee Inglis 6/Billy Blanchard 7/ Andrew Munro 8/Aidan Bowie 9/ James Brooks 10/ Jonny Buist 11/ Liam Henderson 12/ Craig Jones