Alloa Athletic 1 - 2 Airdrie United
(2 votes, average: 3 out of 5)
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As predicted in Friday’s Match Preview, Airdrie United defeated Alloa Athletic 2-1 on Saturday to keep in touch with league leaders Ross County, who won 4-2 at Cowdenbeath.
Goals from in-form Allan Russell and strike partner Byran Prunty had Airdrie on easy street although they were made to dig deep for the final 10 minutes as Alloa mounted some late pressure.
Airdrie lined up with a new 3-4-1-2 formation with new signing Steven Campbell playing in a three man backline alongside Steven McKenna and Bobby Donnelly. Ricky Waddell was preferred as a left wingback to Paul Lovering, who was on the bench.
Intriguingly, Diamonds boss Kenny Black deployed Stuart Noble “in the hole” behind the front two of Prunty and Russell and this was a move that worked well in my opinion with the former Fulham star able to burst from deep and provide us with an additional goal threat that has been lacking in a static 4-4-2 formation.
Alloa started the brightest and it took a few good stops from Stephen Robertson to keep the scores level. Slightly against the run of play Airdrie took the lead after Allan Russell rocketed home into the top corner from the edge of the box after the hosts failed to clear a corner from Waddell. From there, Airdrie were strongly in control of the match and were denied further goals only by good stops from Raymond Jellema from Russell and Noble.
Into the second half and again Airdrie were controlling the tempo, looking very comfortable at the back and keeping the ball well. A second goal was added when Bryan Prunty evaded the offside trap and calmly slotted home to seemingly put the tie beyond Alloa.
Kenny replaced Noble with Kevin Watt with around 15 minutes to go and this move co-incided (not that I’m linking it I want to stress) with us falling out the game as for the first time this season, Alloa started to put us under a bit of pressure. I felt we could have done with either Kevin McDonald (our captain for the day) or Marco Andreoni occupying a holding role during this spell of pressure as we seemed to be getting cut open through the middle a little easily.
Alloa sub Andy Scott pulled one back for the home side with a shot from the edge of the box. It was then a little nervous for the last 10 minutes with Alloa having a lot of pressure although admittedly they didn’t do much with it. Still, a good three points for Airdrie although performances will need to be improved for Monday’s visit of Kilmarnock.
Final Score - Alloa Athletic 1 - 2 Airdrie United (Russell, Prunty)
Player Ratings:
Robertson: Made a number of good saves and was solid throughout (7/10)
Campbell: Slotted in well and looks to be a decent signing (7/10)
Donnelly: Pulled about a little bit, but reasonably solid (6/10)
McKenna: Defended well, coped well with new system (6/10)
Smith: Poor first half but improved in the second (6/10)
Waddell: Looks much more comfortable as a left back/wing back than a winger (7/10)
Andreoni: Wasted the ball more often than usual, not one of his better games (6/10)
McDonald: Captain for the day (rightly so in my opinion) and worked hard (7/10)
Noble: Added an extra attacking dimension to our play, linked well with front two and unlucky not to score (7/10)
Prunty: Took his goal well, but doesn’t do enough for me (6/10)
Russell: Led by example again. Strong, determined, hard working and led the line excellently (8/10)
Man of the Match: Allan Russell
Felt we sat back towards the end and invited Alloa pressure unnecessarily but it’s a good three points and keeps us in the hunt.
Jan 27th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
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