Clyde v Montrose

Recap

Clyde’s Ladbrokes League 2 promotion bid suffered another blow this afternoon, as Montrose left Broadwood with a point following an action-packed and at times controversial match.

Barry Ferguson made two changes following last week’s defeat to Arbroath, with John Gibson replacing Marc Waters in goals and David Marsh returning from suspension to take the place of Mark McLaughlin.

The first chance of the match was created by The Bully Wee, as on loan Jordan Kirkpatrick came close after getting on the end of Scott Linton’s cross.

However, at the other end, the visitors took the lead when a low ball from the right wing found Adrian Mallagaray in the box and he swept a low shot past Gibson and into the bottom corner.

Kirkpatrick then saw his turn and shot saved but, from a similar position, he soon equalised with an excellent strike into the bottom corner of the net.

Before the half-time break, JP McGovern had a chance but missed the target, before Mallagaray came close for The Gable Endies with a header.

As Clyde pushed to get into the lead in the second half, Kirkpatrick hit the top of the bar with a 25 yard free-kick.

After 66 minutes, a goal arrived as an attempted move between David Gormley and Sean Higgins forced a mistake in the Montrose defence and Scott Durie pounced to smash the ball home.

The lead didn’t last long though and the visitors soon equalised with a bizarre goal. After a shot was spilled by Gibson, the Clyde ‘keeper appeared to be pushed into the net along with the ball, but after it came back out into play, referee Steven Kirkland waved play on and Terry Masson was in the right place to knock the ball back in again.

With time running out, there was an agonising moment in front of the away goal as a bouncing ball was deflected or saved on its way to just missing the post and going out for a corner.

In injury time, a Montrose breakaway led to Gary Fraser being put through on Gibson and he made no mistake, seemingly winning the match for the Angus side.

There was though, time for one more moment of refereeing controversy as Mr. Kirkland pointed to the spot after John Gemmell went down at the edge of the box after going for a header. Linton stepped up to make it 3-3 with virtually the last kick of the match.