Wasted Journey!

It's exactly 84 miles from East Belfast to Ballinmallard and if you follow Sat Nav, the last ten miles of your journey will be on country roads that are no more than lanes, one of them is aptly named Clabby Road. Or if you take the Enniskillen route, it is about 6 miles further, but you're at least on decent roads. That's what I learned about yesterday's trip to Fernly Park, the football from the Sky Blues was abysmal to say the least but this wasn't helped by bungling officials, who managed to miss a blatant head-butt on Archie, which resulted in him having to come off for treatment at the side-line. His assailant, Curran, didn't come off so lucky, he had to be substituted, Sky Blue fans that I spoke to were in agreement, he deserved nothing better. Referee Tim Marshal added insult to injury by instructing Captain Jenks to play the ball back to the Mallard's keeper Alvin Rouse.

United showing one change from last Saturday's line-up, Neil Lowry in for Ally Teggart, never got going on the bumpy pitch, too many misplaced passes and Jenks threat was nullified and when he did get a chance, his touch deserted him. Cush, the pick of our forwards was harshly booked for a lunging tackle, his first foul and then subjected to retribution from the Mallards players that went unpunished. Jamie D was ploughing a lone furrow up front, but he looked to be fouled as he headed goalwards, referee Marshal gave a corner. Dwayne Nelson was in inspired form and he dealt efficiently with everything the Mallards could muster. Cookie done some great things but then messed up on the simple things, but Johnny Taylor was a tower of strength and he needed to be. Halftime was reached scoreless, well we had no ideas how to breach the home defence and our back four and keeper were rock steady.

2nd half
The second half was almost a carbon copy of the first, but we had more of the play, without troubling Alvin Rouse in the home team's goal. Ten minutes into the half Spike took off Vaulsey and brought on Kane and we started to look more dangerous, but the final pass was not there. In one mazy run, Jamie D found himself an opening but his shot flew harmlessly wide. Then Cush sent a powder-puff shot into the arms of Rouse from the edge of the box, after good work from Thompson. Sparky came on for Lowry supposedly to take some of the weight off Jamie D, but it didn't work. What was working very well was the relationship between Mallards manager Whitey Robinson and referee Tim Marshal. Every time Whitey shouted for a Sky Blue player to be booked, referee Marshal flourished the yellow card.

Spike was livid with this turn of events and he remonstrated with the 4th official all to no avail. Assistant manager Lee Docherty took up the cause, but the 4th official was unimpressed with his diatribe and he sat down. The Mallards had a couple of chances late on but couldn't take advantage of them and the match petered out to a draw, which was a fair result, if boring. Spike knows the problems we face, we're not creating enough openings going forward and he needs to change things now he has these three opening fixtures behind him. I suppose if somebody had said at the start of the season I'll give you 5 points and no goals conceded, Spike would have said I'll take that. But it was obvious at this game we need another plan if sitting back and hitting on the break is not working and we need it fast!

Nelson (8), Vaulsey (7)(Sub: Kane 7,), Ruddy (7) Cookie (6), Taylor (8), Archie (7), Lowry (6)(Sub: Sparky 6,), Jenks (6), Thompson (7), Cush (8), Jamie D (6)

Man of the match: Dwayne Nelson