Sunday 28th February 2010
Queen's Park 15s set their alarm clocks for an early rise as they travelled to Alloa for an 11am KO. The 15s injury list was beginning to diminish with only Michael Stewart unfit to play. Queen's welcomed back Craig Marshall, Kieran Tolland, Connor McGuiness and also drafted in young Fabio Capuano from the 14s making his second appearance. Queen’s coaches again echoed the importance of a good start as Alloa had proved to be a tough test in their previous two meetings.
A shivering cold wind was causing problems for both teams but it was Queen's that were having the majority of possession but were unable to break down the Alloa's defence with their final ball being the cause.
Against the run of the play Alloa took the lead with a mix up in the Queen’s defence leaving the Alloa striker to pass the ball into a vacant Queen’s goal.
Queen's responded very quickly with a long ball over to Craig Johnston whose sublime first touch enabled his second to be a strike by the diving Alloa keeper.
In the second period Alloa started well and were beginning to have more of the ball. Their pressure was rewarded as Queen's gave away a silly free kick that was expertly placed into the top right hand corner of the Queen's goal.
The 15s coaches looked for a reaction and weren’t disappointed as the boys dominated, hitting the bar three times. A goal followed with good play and a great delivery into the penalty box for Raymond Lynch to powerfully strike home.
The 15’s play was beginning to cause problems for Alloa with good link up play especially down the left hand side between Jonathon Brown, Aiden Connolly and Raymond Lynch.
Fabio and Kieran came on for Connor McGuiness and Gavin Mitchell as Queen's continued to pressurise the Alloa goal.
The third period continued with Queen's putting Alloa under pressure and it was Craig Johnston who scored with an opportunist goal, as he used his body strength to shrug a challenge from Alloa defender to finish with a great strike from a very acute angle
This spurred Queen's on to produce some of their best football as they built from the back with Craig Marshall and Alex Greir keeping good possession.
From an Alloa corner Ryan Ritchie collected and quickly picked out Raymond Lynch who flicked on with the head to find Craig who played the ball onto a galloping Aiden Connolly who showed good composure to place a low shoot by the Alloa keeper.
Queen's Coaches commented "Our start was a bit sloppy today but once we settled into the game we played some entertaining football. We always look to play from the back and a special mention to Craig Marshall, on return from injury, put in a composed and excellent performance. Well done Craig".
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