Queen of the South v Clyde

Recap

Clyde, faced a Queen’s team still coming to terms with the mid-week dismissal of manager Iain Scott, started brightly on a pitch made soft by considerable pre-match rain in Dumfries.

The Bully Wee started brightly, whilst the manager-less Doonhamers suffered an early blow after just eight minutes when their veteran midfielder Brian McLaughlin went off following a strong challenge from Clyde’s Stephen O’Donnell.

Brian McLaughlin’s replacement was the previous season’s top scorer David McNiven, who added his customary pace and goal threat, almost springing the Clyde offside trap within a minute of coming on.

The trend of the game then resumed, with Clyde missing a good chance in the tenth minute when Michael McGowan got on the end of a typically inviting far-post cross from Eddie Malone but he shot well over the ball over from three yards out.

Both sides were finding it difficult to keep possession due to the difficult underfoot conditions, which should have been to the advantage of the forwards. In the twenty-fifth minute Queen’s John O’Neill almost opened the scoring with a fine snap shot from the edge of the box.

The deadlock continued despite a couple of long-range efforts from Clyde’s Steven Masterton. As half-time approached, Stephen O’Donnell’s half-volley was almost the decisive finishing touch to an impressive bit of interchange play between Eddie Malone and Alex Williams but Colin Scott saved at full stretch.

The first piece of real quality play in the second half was sufficient to create the breakthrough. In the fifty-second minute, Alex Williams slipped the ball through to Craig Bryson, whose clever cut-back was slotted home by Neil McGregor, to the delight of the vociferous Bully Wee support.

Queen’s caretaker manager Stuart Lovell responded with a double substitution in the sixty-fourth minute, bringing on Steve Bowery and Scott Robertson.

Half-way through the second half, Clyde’s Tom Brighton fired his shot wide with only Scott to beat. It could have been an expensive miss when a free header from Scott Robertson went wide from eight yards out.

Queens had another opportunity to equalise in the seventy-fourth minute when John O’Neill latched on to a clever back-heel from Eric Patton back heel, but O’Neill’s shot missed the target from just seven yards. A minute later Stephen O’Donnell broke down the left and Alex Williams met his inch-perfect cross at the near post to side-foot it home.

Queens pulled a goal back with two minutes remaining, when a fine cross by John O’Neill was powered home by danger man David McNiven off the underside of the bar from six yards out. It was no signal for a very late Dumfries fight-back. Indeed it was Colin Scott who stopped the winning margin increasing on the stroke of full time when he tipped the ball over from a twenty-yard Stephen O’Donnell free kick.

“Classy Clyde”, was how one paper described the Bully Wee over the week-end; another referred to Clyde’s “brilliant attacking play”. It’s a far cry from the pre-season comments about the quality of the team assembled by Graham Roberts. This Palmerston victory stretched Clyde’s unbeaten run to six games – and none of the “experts” predicted that sort of form either!

Graahm Roberts was delighted with his young team’s efforts in the second forty-five minutes: ""Our second half performance was excellent and the two goals we scored were straight from the top drawer."