Only fixture to beat weather is festive cracker!

Jan 8 2009 by Andrew McGilvray, Hamilton Advertiser

ONLY one game in the West of Scotland escaped the weekend’s cold snap - but it was a festive cracker, with Newmains United and Wishaw serving up an eight-goal thriller.

The game had already been switched to Wishaw Sports Centre in a bid to beat the freeze, using their third-generation artificial surface, but even then some last-gasp ‘first aid'’ was required to free the frost around one corner flag.

Sports centre staff, club officials and players trampled the ice to free the small corner and get the game on.

When the action got underway, Wishaw bounced back from the loss of a first-minute goal to beat their local rivals 5-3.

Former Wishaw striker Gary Murdoch gave United the lead after less than a minute.

But the lead was short-lived as David Lynch equalised six minutes later and then fired Wishaw into the lead.

Robbie Burns added a third, with Lynch completing his hat-trick before half-time.

Jody Thomson reduced the leeway to 4-2, substitute Paul Noble added Wishaw’s fifth and Jason Rafferty completed the scoring after coming off the Newmains bench.

Victory sent Wishaw soaring four places up the league into fifth but the result left Newmains stranded on bottom spot, still seeking their first league win after nine attempts.

Experienced goalkeeper Scott Brunton who, with fellow coach Jim Morrison took charge of the side in Wishaw manager Alex Young’s absence, said: “It was a decent game, with some good passing movement.

“We have a young side who like to pass the ball about and the artificial surface is conducive to a good passing game.

“It was good to be able to gain some points on teams ahead of us.

“We were 4-1 ahead at half-time and although we maybe slipped back a little in the second half as Newmains started to push forward, we still created a few good chances.”

Disappointed Newmains manager Ian Rankin said: “We just didn’t start in the first half despite scoring a first-minute goal and again the goals we lost were due to individual errors.

“I told them at half-time that I wasn’t happy with the performance and the guys responded well in the second half when I thought we were actually the better team.

“I was pleased that the game was played. It was a battling performance but I was very disappointed with the result. We had to take off recent signing Gary Gay when he pulled a calf muscle during the warm-up.”

He added: “We’re trying to build a new side. It is taking time to settle and establish itself but we still have quite a few games to go and I’m optimistic that we can put a few points on the board.

“But to make it happen the players have got to believe in themselves.”