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Gartcairn thumping wascoming, saysskipper
Gartcairn captain Ross Mcneil says nobody expected he and his teammates to beat Beith in the Scottish Junior Cup – but the resounding 6-0 victory was no surprise to him.
The Airdrie club progressed in some style against the 2016 winners to reach the fourth round. Mcneil grabbed a double while Josh Gracie, David Sinclair, Scott Stevenson and Liam Craig also got in on the act.
Beith are ninth in the West of Scotland Football League Premier Division while Gartcairn are third in Conference B, so it was an eye-opener for some when the scoreline came in.
The encounter didn’t come as a shock to Mcneil as Gartcairn have scored 51 league goals in 15 games, and somebody was due to get a bruising defeat.
“I don’t think many people from Beith would have expected that and I don’t think we may even have thought of that scoreline before the game,”said Mcneil.
“I think the whole of A yrshire would
have backed Beith to beat us, but we were confident before it. They’ve been playing really well, too.
“But we have also been playing really well and we have some really good players in our team.
“When it got to 4-0, to be perfectly honest, we weren’t exceeding expectations.
“All of our players have played at high levels so this didn’t surprise me. We were threatening to give somebody a doing but we should have been out of sight at half-time.”
Gartcairn will take on Arthurlie in the next round of the competition and head into a Kilmarnock Pie WOSFL Cup Preliminary Round tie against Glenafton Athletic this weekend.
“It was 6-0 on Saturday and it should have been more,”added Mcneil.
“We hit the post, the goalkeeper made a few good saves and we created a few other chances.
“Beith had an off day and we had a good day. You mix that and it should have been more.
“We’ve been playing well and we want to keep winning games of football.
“Teams in our league are doing really well.
“Cambuslang Rangers and St
Cadoc’s – who are above us in the league – are winning games all the time so we need to put a run together.
“That’s what we are doing.”