Rovers derby drama
CARLUKE ROVERS ............................. 2 LESMAHAGOW ................................... 1
Carluke pulled off a dramatic injurytime win over 10-man Lesmahagow on derby day.
The visitors came into the game in good form with two victories on the bounce whereas Carluke were looking to get back on track after a disappointing defeat last week to league leaders Shettleston.
Lesmahagow were awarded a penalty when McDonald failed to control the ball properly and then in trying to recover was short with his passback to the Carluke keeper McAllister.
In his attempt to reach the ball first the keeper unfortunately didn’t make it and pulled the Lesmahagow striker down leaving the ref with no option but to point to the spot.
Up stepped the experienced Kris Jarvie who coolly sent the keeper the wrong way.
Lesmahagow were being restricted to very few chances and their best opportunities seemed to be from set pieces. It was one such free kick into the box which saw Steven Clark rise unchallenged in the middle of the six yard box but his header went wide much to the relief of the Rovers defence.
Unfortunately for Lesmahagow they were to rue this miss a couple of minutes later when Ciaran Lafferty latched onto a through ball from Conor McDonald and passed it into the net just inside the left hand post to level the game.
The game turned in Carluke’s favour in the 66th minute when Gary Nicholson of Lesmahagow was red carded for a second bookable offence when he brought down Maxi Neossi in midfield.
This set up a frenetic last 15 minutes with Carluke pushing hard for the goal that would end the contest.
However, just as it looked as if the 10 men of Lesmahagow were going to survive with a point Carluke got their winner as the clock ticked into the 90th minutes.
Craig Grierson picked the ball up in midfield and threaded a pass through to Dom McMeekin.
He drove in to the box and just as it looked as though he had run out of space he managed to cut the ball across the face of the goal where Paul Donaghy was waiting to bundle the ball over the line to make the score 2-1.
Rovers face another tough derby test this weekend as they clash with Lanark.