A single goal, scored in the first minute of the second half, separated the teams as Edinburgh City withstood Dalkeith Thistle’s pressure to claim a tough 1-0 victory in the South East U15’s Division Two. Featuring even teams and occasionally uneven tempers, it was a match in which fortitude was prevalent but a moment of skill was decisive.
The first half nearly began with a bang when City’s Finley Pattman was played through seconds into the game. His shot went wide left, but it was indicative of a start in which the home side pinned Thistle back. Clearances were calmly picked up and the encampment continued. Possession was liberally one-sided.
Nonetheless, chances were rare, and the opening twenty minutes raised few efforts on goal. Indeed, Dalkeith had the best opportunities, with Ryan Wilkinson beating keeper Danny Smith to a long ball but subsequently running out of pitch, and Jamie Kennedy unable to make full contact on a free kick to the far post. Edinburgh City’s two shots were from Patryk Zawislak and James Mullen, and both from a distance too far to properly stretch Thistle’s Mackenzie Ewing.
A quarter of the game had thus passed when a true chance came. With play evening out, Thistle’s Kennedy sent in a cloud-grazing cross from the right that caused problems, leading to Wilkinson and Adam Cairns both eventually having goes in the scramble. There was no way through, but the game was beginning to suggest a goal was imminent.
That opener could have come for City twice in the last ten minutes of the half. First Pattman, and then Luke Taylor, found himself running clear at goal. But whereas the scramble at one end had ended under a blanket defence, Ewing now proved himself a one-man wall. Staying big even as he saw the whites of the strikers eyes allowed him to repel both forwards, and half-time arrived goalless.