Reaction

For the second time this season Stranraer have managed to come back and snatch a 2-2 draw in games against “The Wasps”, when Alloa Athletic should have collected full points. Failure to convert chances and having the worst goals against record at present in the league is why the team is still at the wrong end of the league table. Once again on Saturday the team had the lions share of possession and chances to win the game but could not hold on for three more league points. After defeating Brechin City the previous week it had been hoped another three points would be a great boost, before next Saturday’s derby against Stirling Albion.

allan maitland after stranraer draw

In many ways today’s game sums up our season , I thought our start was absolutely terrible, the goal we gave away was sloppy at the very least even before it got to the back post where Scot Buist should have dealt with it , so we found ourselves a goal down and this creates a bit anxiety, we then proceed to miss three or four great chances but Scott Black in that spell played really well and had three or four really good saves, we got back into the game at the rebound from the penalty kick and at that stage we should be bombing on and going to win the game. The second half I think we start the game alright, Bomber misses a great chance with a header but he scores anyway and we get ourselves ahead but for some reason instead of being able to show a bit of composure we continue to chase the game, it was incredible and the goal we lose comes from – the ball’s in our box we manage to break away , we have four bodies in their box , the ball should have been played across the face of the goal, we lose possession of the ball in their box , we had three midfield players in their box at that time, so all of a sudden you have three midfield players and two forwards out of the game and they break away and we find ourselves stretched, good teams don’t do that. It shows there is a lot of work still to be done in our team at a stage in the game we were in total control of the game, we must go and win these games, there is no excuse for not winning today. So we are disappointed not to have won the game, all credit to Stranraer for battling away showing great spirit today but it’s a game we should have put away, in the first half with the number of chances we had and once we got ahead we should never have allowed them back in the game, that’s twice we have let Stranraer back in games with late goals after being 2-1 ahead and not finishing off matches. Last week we managed to beat Brechin City, hanging on at the end , but we have lost too many goals this season which isn’t good enough and we have failed to kill teams off when we have been given the chance, today was another example of that, so very disappointing for us, today was a magnificent opportunity for us to get above some of the other teams in our league but we have failed to take that opportunity, unless we can beat teams like Stranraer then we are going to continue to find ourselves at the bottom end of this league, we will try to address this with a victory over Stirling Albion next week.