Bayview stalemate but Mcdonald is happy ‘back door pretty much shut’
The Fifers played out their first goalless draw of the season after a clash with the Rosey Posey.
The game broke the trend of the two sides’ high-scoring clashes, where there were eight goals in the two previous meetings.
It was the visitors who started on the front foot and held the majority of the ball in the opening five minutes, but Fife looked deadly on the counter, forcing Bonnyrigg to retreat.
Chances were hard to come by at Bayview, as both teams marshalled their backlines well.
The host team’s best chance of the half came around the 20-minute mark, when Scott Shepherd latched on to a ball that seemed destined to be going out for a goal-kick. He then flicked it over keeper Mark Weir, but the goalie managed to tip it just wide.
The resulting corner routine deserved a goal, but Weir made an excellent save again to keep the scores level.
At the start of the second half, home goalkeeper Allan Fleming made an excellent diving save to deny Kieran Mitchell from close range.
The only other action of note saw Rose’s captain Jonathan Stewart sent to the stands after a second bookable offence, pulling Trouten to the ground.
In the closing stages, the Black and Gold were knocking on the door, but could not find the breakthrough.
Post-match, East Fife manager Greg Mcdonald commented on the team’s defensive performance:
“We’ve worked hard on it in training. The last few weeks we’ve had a lot of attacking temp, but we’ve not had the back door shut. In this game, however, it was pretty much shut.”
STENHOUSEMUIR 1 FORFAR ATHLETIC 2
Forfar’s good form under new boss Ray Mckinnon continued with a well-earned win.
The Loons took the lead in the 17th minute through Stefan Mccluskey, who fired a Craig Thomson cross home from close range.
The Warriors looked to have equalised in the 48th minute when Euan O’reilly slotted the ball past Marc Mccallum, but was flagged for offside in what was a tight decision.
To compound matters for the home side, Forfar immediately scored their second goal when a long ball was met by Ben Armour and he showed good footwork to create an opening before firing home.
Stenhousemuir got a lifeline in timeadded when Callum Yeats scored, but they were unable to make further inroads before the final whistle.
Forfar Manager Ray Mckinnon was fairly happy, commenting: “The boys did well today and we had to work hard for the victory.
“We had a couple of setbacks in the first half with injuries to Craig Slater and Darren Whyte. So we had to reorganise at half-time with a different shape and we saw the game out well, to be fair.
“The goals were good finishes and we had a couple of other chances.
“All in all, it was pretty good.”
For Stenhousemuir, Sean Crighton was taking the team for the first time as caretaker-manager.
He said: “Obviously, the result was not what I was looking for, but, I will be honest, I actually enjoyed watch the team play some really good football.
“However, we didn’t get the rub of the green.
“Sometimes you have got to make your own luck and we didn’t do that, but the players gave me everything.”