Fired up Glens hit the ground running
Two games in two days .. including 13-0 victory
Glencairn got their pre-season matches underway with two games in two days – including a 13- 0 hammering of Royal Albert.
The Glens made the annual trip to Kilbirnie for the James Glen Memorial Trophy tournament.
They were paired with Port Glasgow Juniors in the opening match on Saturday, while hosts Kilbirnie Ladeside entertained Royal Albert in game two.
The Glens fielded five of their nine new signings against Port, with the other four on the substitutes’ bench.
Despite being the better side in the first half, Glencairn were unable to make the breakthrough and the scoreline was blank at the interval.
However, the deadlock was broken by Port midway through the second half as a cross from the right found Jasper Donnelly in space, and he controlled the ball before firing it past Scott McLellan.
It looked like that would be the winner, until Glencairn equalised right at the end.
Kris Gebbie’s free kick took an awkward bounce in front of the Port keeper, and the ball rebounded into the net for a debut goal for the former Cambuslang Rangers captain to force a penalty shoot-out.
Glencairn seemed to be coasting to victory when Port missed their first two efforts and Glencairn scored their first three.
But, incredibly, four misses in a row from Glencairn meant that Port won on sudden death and went through to the final to face Kilbirnie.
The third place play-off on Sunday turned into a one- way procession as a strong starting Glencairn side annihilated Royal Albert 13-0.
Although the west regional Central District Two champions were hampered by the unavailability of several of their regular players, Gary Whyte, Del Esplin and Dale Simeon started for the Glens in the rout for the first time.
Rutherglen had their own fitness agenda though, and they went about their business effectively to race into a 6-0 lead before half-time.
Liam Gormley grabbed the opener, while Jay McKay helped himself to a first-half hat-trick, added to first Glencairn goals for namesake defenders Ryan Kerr and Stevie Kerr.
It would have been worse for Albert had Jordan Leyden’s strike not been ruled out for offside.
There was no let-up from Glencairn in the second half as Ryan McArdle got on the scoresheet, while last season’s top scorer Gary Smith came off the bench to grab a second half hattrick.
Jay McKay grabbed his fourth goal of the match, while Dale Simeon got his goalscoring account off the mark for Glencairn with a second half double. However, Glencairn had to settle for third place in the tournament once again, the fourth time in the past five years, despite finishing undefeated over both 90 minute matches.