Shottsoutof cupasbigcalls goagainst side
John Mckeown admits Shotts Bon Accord’s Junior Cup quarter-final exit to 10-man Dundee East Craigie was hard to swallow after a number of big decisions went against them.
The Bonny boss was left bewildered after feeling his side had two perfectly good goals ruled out for offside, whilst insisting the winner for East Craigie was miles offside.
Mckeown’s men were looking odds on to reach the last four when they came from Chris Muddie’s spectacular opener for the hosts to equalise thanks to an Ally Martin penalty and then Craigie had a player sent off heading into the final 10 minutes.
However, Rory Faulkner found the winner for the Dundee men in the final four minutes when he slotted home from what Shotts claimed was an offside position.
And Mckeown admits he felt for the strong travelling support who made the trip north from Lanarkshire.
He said:“it was a real hard one to take.”i felt a lot of decisions went against us after dominating most of the game. But we’ve probably not played well enough in the final third to create more chances that could have put the game to bed when we were on top.
“Fair play to East Craigie. They are a young team and they stuck at it, getting their reward at the end.
“But I felt their winning goal was offside. Our guys are convinced of it and he looked miles off, but that’s just the breaks at this level.
“We had complaints about the first goal as well because the lineswoman gave a free kick in the build-up to it. Our player was just stronger than theirs. He shadowed the ball out of the park.
“To be fair, their boy produces a great finish from the free-kick that comes in, going into the top corner.
“We got a deserved equaliser before half-time and for the first 20 minutes of the second half we had then penned in.
“I thought we were going to do it. Then we had a perfectly good goal ruled out for offside from Josh Watt. The whole place couldn’t understand it.
“Shortly after that, Martin Shiels goes through and scores and it wasn’t given. Again, we thought he was well onside so a lot went against us.
“But I was really gutted for all the academy teams who travelled up to support us. We had a great following and we’ve not had that kind of support for a long time, with 200 of them there.
“The place was like a morgue after the game but we need to pick ourselves up because we are miles behind in terms of games in the league.”
• Meanwhile, Larkhall Thistle also crashed out in the last eight, losing 2-1 at home to Rutherglen Glencairn.