SPFL Tier 4, The Rock, 22/04/23.

A win and another clean sheet – thanks to Brett Long for a penalty save and Martin McNiff for the goal, though Carsy missed a penalty for us. That’s a club record of clean sheets in one season for a single goalkeeper.

Combined with Annan’s defeat to Stirling this result means we will finish second.

Not that that matters much as we will be playing whoever finishes third, which might well be East Fife, or Annan.

The first leg is away on 9 or 10/6/23, with the second leg at home on 13/6/23.

Two games till to go before then though. Let’s hope for no more injuries.

Scottish Cup, Round 2, Townhead Park, 21/10/22.

So to deepest, darkest (and wet) Ayrshire.

At least it was a win. Potential banana skin avoided.

But we made hard work of it.

We were on top for most of the first half with some neat approach play but only a Finlay Gray strike just off target to show for it before a leading arm challenge in the box resulted in a penalty. Carsy duly netted past the keeper. Not much else of note occurred before the break.

In the second half they came out more strongly (as was only to be expected) but we made the mistake of letting them back into it. From where I was up the other end – about three or four yards from their keeper at times – it looked to be a mistimed clearance gave them the ball and the equaliser was inevitable from then on.

I was now getting flashbacks to the play-off game at Ainslie Park last May. Not that Brett Long in our goal had too much to do, but still.

We started to press them in the latter stages, had several efforts just off target, but got a reward when Gregor Buchanan headed in after a corner was returned back across goal. He couldn’t really miss. I felt relief more than anything and reflected to myself that we stil hadn’t scored in open play since that one at Methil.

Then almost at the death we did, thanks to them giving the ball away to Finlay Gray. He rounded the keeper beautifully and slotted in.

In the hat for the next round.

Thankfully.

SPFL Tier 4, The Rock, 15/10/22.

Perhaps I am a jinx after all. We haven’t scored a goal in open play since the one I saw at New Bayview. And we’re no longer top of the league. (Okay it’s by goal difference but that’s a ten point lead gone inside four games.)

Whatever, this was a hard watch. Albion Rovers were worth a point and but for three goal-line clearances in nearly as many seconds could have had all three.

We were more or less not in the game for the first ten minutes and Rovers had already hit the post before another misplaced clearance resulted in an opportunity for their player to belt the ball home.

We did come into it and the penalty was an absolute stone-waller. Carsy stepped up to convert. A few minutes later Ally Love had a great chance to put us in the lead but pulled his shot wide. It looked easier to score.

In the second half any promising moves came to nothing due to poor final balls. There was a similar stramash to the one we got away with in the first half but we couldn’t get the ball past their defenders. In the end we were grateful to Brett Long’s fine one handed save late on to salvage a point from this.

If we are as poor as this against Cumnock on Friday I suspect we won’t be in the Cup for the next round draw.

SPFL Tier 4, The Rock, 17/9/22.

Well that’s our first goal – and so first win – against Bonnyrigg.

I don’t know if we ground it out but that’s two 1-0 wins in a row.

Interesting to note it was Carsy who took the penalty. Ally Love took the last two – against Elgin three weeks ago.

And we broke our record of successive wins at the start of a season again – plus equalled the Division’s best ever start.

On Tuesday night we’re at Stranraer for the game postponed from last week. As I said before, they’re our bogey team.

SPFL Tier 3, The Rock, 27/8/22.

Club history!

Never before have we won our first five league games in a row.

Being a Dumbarton supporter of long-standing this is a very unusual circumstance to behold. We have won five games in a row mid-season but I still wonder if I’m dreaming.

We’ve yet to play three of the top five though.

I just don’t know what to think about it.

It’s almost incidental who actually scored but it was Ally Love with two penalties within minutes of each other. (Not Carsy on penalty duty I note.)

It’s East Fife away next week in what, since I live in Fife, amounts to a home game for me.

But since I’ve not seen us live this season I have a quandary. Do I keep doing the same thing as I’ve done every Saturday so far or go to the game and risk being a jinx?

SPFL Tier 4, Cliftonhill,* 6/8/22.

Well. Another win. But we left it late and we were playing against ten men for well over an hour.

Stuart Carswell is on penalty duties again. And there was a first goal for us for Ryan Wallace.

We’ve had false dawns before. I’ll reserve judgement as to how good we might be for a few weeks yet.

Mind you; I can’t remember the last time we came from behind to win a game.

*Apparently the Riegart Stadium for sponsorship purposes. Me neither.

SPFL Tier 3, Recreation Park*, 2/4/22.

What a shock.

We scored. Our first in almost five games.

We scored three.

We won! (For the first time in seven games.) It’s almost certainly too late though.

I “watched” the second half on the BBC Scotland results show. It was 0-0 for so long. All the while Peterhead were in control in their game so our wnning was an absolute must. Then Alloa scored in about 82 minutes. Game over, I thought.

Imagine my surprise when it came up about three minutes later that we’d scored a penalty. Even more so when it was Conner Duthie who scored it. Carsy has been our penalty taker all season. It seems he’d been subbed for Eoghan Stokes though.

Imagine my even greater surprise when Duthie scored again two minutes after that.

However, I just knew they’d equalise. It’s what we do. Not much surprise when it was a pen. Our record of giving them away this season is beyond a joke. 90^th minute it said. At that point I’d have taken a draw even though it was useless to us.

Utter disbelief ensued when I saw Alloa 2-3 Dum on the left upper screen graphic. Then it came up on the videoprinter, scorer Kristoffer Syvertsen. Amazing.

So no goals for over 80 minutes then five in the last ten or so.

It seems from Pie and Bovril we looked like we were playing for a draw for most of the game. Maybe we should try attacking from the start.

Peterhead at home next week. Lose that and it’s ninth at best for us. We have the top two away in the two games following that. Nul points from them I should think.

This game was notable in another way. It’s the first time the Sons have been refereed by a woman, Lorraine Watson to be precise.

*Indodrill Stadium only if you must.

SPFL Tier 3, New Bayview, 12/3/22.

From bad to worse.

A win would have put us above Peterhead and almost certainly doomed East Fife. As it is we are on a doom slide – 3 points out of our last 15 while they are on the opposite trajectory (8 out of the last 15.) Now they are only 3 points below us, and our next two games look daunting while theirs don’t.

We seem to continue to shoot ourselves in the foot. Losing a goal in the first few minutes (again) and having a man sent off (again) even if this one was only in stoppage time. Still, Carsy ought to have known better.

The home games we have left I’ll need to watch through my fingers.

SPFL Tier 3, Broadwood Stadium, 12/2/22.

Well, that was much needed, but by all acoounts Clyde were rubbish.

Still, a win’s a win and not to be sniffed at.

And it was done without big Josh Oyinsan up top. (Pulled hamstring apparently.)

I wasn’t at the game and haven’t seen any higlights yet but it seems Carsy scored from open play! Our other two came from Ross MacLean.

And we’re up to the heady heights of seventh.

Mind you, Peterhead may be two places below us but they’ve got two games in hand.

Next Saturday against Alloa (in eighth) at home is a potential big one.

SPFL Tier 3, The Rock, 29/1/22.

This was encouraging even if Cove were clearly the better team. They passed the ball well, seemed confident in possession, looked as if they had been together for years (which they have by and large) and absolutely brimmed with the confidence you’d expect from the league leaders.

But we were never completely out of it.

We played against the wind in the first half and coped well with it, though without making their keeper do much. Sam Ramsbottom, too, had no more than a couple of things to deal with. Five minutes before half-time we got a penalty when Ross MacLean (reprieved from his ban by the reversal of last week’s red card) sucked ex-Son Morgyn Neill into tripping him at the bye-line in the box. At this point my live stream started buffering so I missed Carsy’s conversion. One nil up at half-time is an unusual experience for Sons latterly but very welcome.

I was less sanguine six minutes into the second half. They were given a penalty that no-one in the ground or watching on the stream could see a reason for – bar the ref. 1-1.

Cove immediately looked in total control and scored again. A cross ball found their man on the right in too much space. His cross was deflected up and Sam Ramsbottom could only tip the ball across the six-yard area where it was scrambled into the net. Game unxpectedly on its head inside two minutes. From then on I had no hope whatsoever of getting something from the game. We couldn’t seem to get a decent out ball. As soon as we cleared it it would come back. Passes forward were hit too long (the wind contributing but account ought to be taken of that) or not to feet.

But despite their dominance Cove didn’t score the goal that would have killed the game though they had a glorious chance which their player somehow managed to scoop over the bar from about six yards.

Towards the end we started to penetrate their half more. It was good to see the team hadn’t resigned themselves to a defeat. Then we got what was perhaps a lucky second penalty when Carlo Pignatiello was adjudged to have been fouled in their box at a fifty-fifty. I wouldn’t have been surprised to see the free-kick go the other way. But it was about time our luck changed.

Carsy despatched his second pen of the game superbly, so notching his first brace ever. All his goals this season – his best scoring – have come from set-pieces. I think it makes him our joint top scorer. He has four.

Our next three games are away against teams above us in the table. We’ll need to take something from those. How that will work out we’ll need to see.

The team ought to take encouragement from this performance though.