Shambolic United!

I took issue with Ballymena Times reporter Stephen Alexander when he stopped writing a report of the match and made his job easier by interviewing three individuals and publishing their thoughts on the match, his column should make interesting reading this week. I've been following United since my dad and my Granda used to take me when I started primary school in the fifties and its true to say they were more bad times, than good, but always the team tried to play football, but not this team. I don't know what system we were playing yesterday, but whatever it was it just didn't work. We usually blame the midfield but during the first half it was the defence's turn, as they they presented Glenavon with three goals and from this point on there was only going to be one winner. In the end Glenavon could have and should have scored more than the seven they settled for and I put the blink on Dwayne by saying he was blameless and then he flaffed at a cross and Kyle Neil was left with the easy task of scoring with a header.

Spike made three changes from his line-up, out went Mahon, Vaulsely and Liggie and in came Chrissy, Alan D and Cush, he also made one positional change with Ruddy moving to leftback. Deciphering the news on the official website that Ross Black has been released, its obvious that Glenn thinks Ruddy and Vaulsely are the 'bees knees' or was Ross Black getting out while the going was good. I was going to say he was a 'rat', for only a rat deserts a sinking ship, but I occasionally have to go to Larne and there's no point in getting their (the harbour rats), or Ross's hackles up. The disaster started as early as the fifth minute when Ruddy was instructed to take a throw-in to Gavin, who promptly gave the ball away and when it was played back again Ruddy's attempt at a header fell nicely to Bates and he released the unmarked Shannon (unmarked because Ruddy had moved inside) and he swept the ball high into the net beating Dwayne all ends up.

Defensive clanger number 2 happened when Chrissy was trying to shield the ball over the goal-line instead of booting it into touch, Bates swung a leg at it and found Martyn unmarked in the six-yard area and he had the easy task of finding the net. Not much was seen of United going forward, but we had one player in Cush but the home team fouled him at every opportunity and referee Tim Marshall, let them. The linesman at the end where all 150 United fans were, was diabolical and missed some blatant offsides and Glenavon third goal looked to be in this category when Mark Farren burst through or was McCullagh just too slow to catch him and despite the despairing dive of Nelson, the ball trickled into the net. Spike had seen enough and he acted bringing off Gavin and bringing on Liggie. I couldn't believe it, we needed a defender to tighten up our defence and he takes off our one tackling midfielder and brings on a forward who has struggled since he pulled on a Sky Blue jersey.

But maybe Glenn, in his wisdom, is trying out different permutations in the remaining matches knowing that our side looks safe from relegation, the mind boggles. United did manage to mount one attack with halftime approaching, when the ball fell to Jenks and with the goal at his mercy he shot against the bar and the chance was lost. I foolishly thought if we could have got one back there, we might have made a match of it in the second half, hope spring eternal from me you see, but it was not to be. The referee blew his whistle for halftime and it was time to discuss what had gone wrong in the first half. We all knew what had gone wrong, our defence had collapsed, like it had many times this season but nobody could come up with a remedy to fix it. I was reminded of an old saying, 'just when you think things are not going to get any worse, they usually do get worse' (or worser, in Ballymena speak).

2nd half
Fresh from their halftime cuppa United did try to make a match of it at the start of the 2hd half but Liggie's shot cannoned off a post and the chance was lost. Normal service was resumed when from a Kyle Neil free-kick, Liggie turned the ball into his own net. That goal came in the 54th minute and six minutes later from a corner the United defence stood idly by and watched player/manager Gary Hamilton, who had come on as a second half sub, play an overhead kick to Brown, who supplied another overhead kick to score the home teams 5th goal. When the the only outfield player we had, Cush was blatantly body-checked and subsequently had to go off it was the end of the match for us. Referee Martin added insult to injury by only flourishing a yellow card, when it should have been red, for it was a brutal foul.

Neil Lowry replaced Cush but by then it was a damage limitation time for United and they fell further behind when Nelson flaffed at a cross and Neil headed home to make the score six to the home team. That goal came in 66 minutes and Thommo made way soon after for Sparky. Referee Martin had already booked McCullagh and Thommo and he completed the set adding Ruddy's name in an 8 minute spell, but there wasn't a bad foul in any of them. With 10 minutes remaining, the best player on the field, Bates, completed the scoring, lobbing the hapless Nelson, but he was let down by his defenders who stood around like mutton dummies. Yet another defensive collapse, but the others had been to teams in the top six, this one was all the more galling that it was to a team two places below us. No top six finish for us this year and we appear to be in free-fall and we play DC next, maybe we should board up the goals at the Showgrounds!

Dwayne (6), Kane (5), Ruddy (5), McCullagh (4), Chrissy (4), Gavin (5)(Sub: Liggie 5,), Thommo (5)(Sub: Sparky 5,), Alan D (4), Jenks (4), Cush (7)Sub: Lowry 6,), Dolan (5)

Man of the match: Cush