Saintfield AYC 4 vs. 5 Castleabbey FC
Bridge Centre, Killyleagh, 31-08-2013
Saintfield AYC hosted Castleabbey FC on Saturday for the clubs second matches of the season seeing Saintfield coming out as the favourite's after their 6-0 win last week taking them to top of the table, but the abbey lads were not intimidated and were looking forward to a strong fought match. The match was moved to the Bridge Centre in Killyleagh and with no referee in attendance both clubs agreed to have a member from each ref either half and after the long wait the match kicked off 30 minutes later than expected. Saintfield to the advantage in the first 5 minutes with a flick on header lobbing the keeper to give them an early lead, this seemed to bring the abbey lads down and resulted in a few mistakes letting the Saintfield side put two more past the abbey keeper to give them a 3-0 lead going into half time.
With some strong words from the gaffer, William Palin, at half time the abbe players came out fighting strong for the second half determined to gain the three points on offer and start strong they did when shortly into the 2nd half a scrambled ball into the box finally found Nathan Currans head and then the back of saintfield's net, the abbey comeback was on! This was the breaking point for Saintfield and again Curran's head did damage to AYC's lead when another cross was put into the box and Curran turned, flicked it backwards with his head and brought the Saintfield lead down to one goal.
Abbey continued to be strong and when Stephan Kearney was brought down in the box by the AYC keeper the abbey were awarded a penalty, Nathan Curran stepped up to the spot and struck the ball firmly into the keepers top right corner to bring the abbey level with Saintfield at 3-3, but Saintfield didn’t give up hope and shortly after received a corner and when the ball was swung into the box it met the head off a Saintfield player and spun into the net giving AYC the lead again.
the Abbey were not giving up on those three points though and with a great run from Shane Baggley with the ball he squared it through the box to Stephan Kearney who smoothly headed it home to bring the game back to 4-4, but Castleabbey FC were not content with just one point and when Saintfield failed to get their winner in the last few minutes the Abbey players took advantage of a great save from Cookie McKinney and quickly caught AYC out on the break with Shane Baggley receiving the ball at the half way line, running it into the left side of the box to go 1 on 1 with the keeper but spotted Robbie Palin coming in on his right he squared the ball to Robbie who side footed it into the Saintfield AYC goal to give Castleabbey FC their well-deserved three points and to put them second on the table with two great wins in two weeks.
