2005/06 Season Review

A serialised account of our season by our man who has been at every match home and away - Ewan Lithgow

Part Eight - February

Due to our early exit from the Scottish Cup it was the second Saturday in the month before we returned to action but what a pivotal day it would prove to be. Queens had won only once at Dens Park since the World War 2 whilst Clyde had freely conceded that with Tuesday's cup replay at Gretna in mind they would be fielding more or less a reserve side at Stranraer. The portents weren't good. Fortunately it was what actually happened on the pitch that mattered more than what everyone expected to happen. Clyde's stiffs were two up inside four minutes at Stair Park but even before that Queens had their noses in front in Dundee courtesy of Andy Thomson snaffling up a rebound when young Scott Murray failed to hold a Burns snap-shot. Stranraer in fact would go on to lose by an incredible 5-0 to Clyde but it was what was happening at Dens that was of more importance. And what was happening was that the home side began to take a solid grip of proceedings. Simon Lynch scored an equaliser that was long overdue before half time and when the same player bagged a second goal early in the second half you couldn't see any way back for a Queens side who hadn't managed a shot since the first minute. Funny old game though football! Midway through the second half Michael Mullen was sent on and duly turned the game around by running at the home defence. With 67 minutes on the clock Bobby Mann poleaxed Paul Burns but the referee played a great advantage and Mullen was off and running through the home defence before providing as cool a finish as you could ever hope to see. As if that wasn't good enough, with ten minutes to go Eric Paton hobbled off injured and Gary Wood came on to play auxiliary wingback. Within 60 seconds he'd hammered in a wonderful "Goal of the Season" from all of 30 yards to steal the points away. Three efforts on target we managed all day but it was enough for a 3-2 victory and the "Great Escape" theme music was starting to make an appearance on the terraces again. The gap was six points to Stranraer, and Brechin had been dropped.

Next up was a home match with Brechin City and a match most people thought we had to win to keep up the pressure on Stranraer. They were to be disappointed though as Craig Nelson again produced an exemplary display to deny us any better than a 0-0 draw. Andy Thomson and Derek Lyle had efforts cleared off the line and Gary Wood late on missed a one on one with Nelson. However, with Stranraer going down 3-1 at Paisley the gap had reduced to 5 points.

Paton breaks forward

The following weekend was another blank one due to the Scottish Cup but a closed door friendly with Dumbarton was arranged for Palmerston. Before then McCall also chose to announce that Chris Carr had been told he would be released at the end of the season. The Dumbarton friendly was NOT encouraging at all. The second division strugglers won rather comfortably at Palmerston by 3-0 despite a strong home line up. Worse news was to follow later in the day as Stranraer picked up a surprise point at Dingwall to move the gap back up to 6 points again. We were back in action on the Tuesday night with the home match against Dundee rearranged from December but for the second game running it ended up scoreless, which was probably fair enough this time. The gap was back down to 5 points again but our game in hand had disappeared. Ewan Lithgow

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