shannon2007

The Billy Buchanan Diaries - 30

For Scotland, we had two more World Cup Qualifiers during the course of the season. After our superb triumph against goalkeeperless Ukraine, we returned to Hampden to face group favourites Sweden. Once more the press were whining about too many Forfar players, but in my opinion this is a good thing for the national side as it allowed greater consistancy.

We expected a tough match against Sweden, and although nothing concrete would be decided here, a win for us would put us in a very good position indeed. Just four minutes into the game we had the lead, through Steven Murray, and two minutes later a scorcher from David Davidson made it two, and Sweden were reeling. Only another five minutes had passed when Scott Adams added a third and it looked as if we might get a cricket score.

But football is rarely like that, and by half time it was still three nil. Three minutes after the break though, we had our fourth thanks to Scott Craig and although Ibrahimovic scored for the Swedes on 50, we were never in any danger. Eighteen minutes from time, Steven Murray completed the scoring, and we had made everyone sit up and take notice.

Many people now expected us to travel to Israel for the match that would bring us halfway to qualifying, and win easily. But the Israeli's are a tough team to break down, especially at home, and by half time there was still no scoring. It seemed only a matter of time though, and sure enough four minutes after the restart, Scott Craig got what turned out to be the only goal of the game.

Five games, five wins, and if we can keep this kind of form up, then the World Cup Finals are beckoning once more.

How They Played

versus Sweden (home) David Shearer 6; Scott McKeown 7, Declan Lawless 8, David Barker 8, Paul O'Neill 8; Kevin McMillan 7, David Davidson 8, Scott Adams 8; Scott Craig 9, Alan MacDonald 8, Steven Murray 9 Subs: John Ferguson (for Alan MacDonald, 53) 7, John Foley (for Scott Adams, 53) 7, Ross Kelly (for David Davidson, 53) 8.

versus Israel (away) David Shearer 8; Scott McKeown 7, Declan Lawless 8, David Barker 7, Paul O'Neill 7; Kevin McMillan 8, David Davidson 7, Scott Adams 8; Scott Craig 8, Alan MacDonald 7, Steven Murray 8 Subs: John Foley (for Alan MacDonald (inj), 62) 7, John Ferguson (for Steven Murray, 70) 7

shannon2007

The UEFA Champions League Final
Dinamo Kiev versus Forfar Athletic
Wednesday 29th May 2013
Old Trafford, Manchester (37,834)

For the third time then, we had reached the Final of the most prestigious club tournament in the World. Twice before we had been left bitterly dissapointed, but surely, despite the bookies making Kiev favourites, tonight would be our night. Apart from the fact that in my opinion we were the better team, we would also have the bulk of the support at a far from sold out Old Trafford. Over 25,000 Forfar tickets were sold, but it seems few from the Ukraine could travel to this game, and we intend to make the ones that did wish they hadn't bothered.

Kiev's route to the Final has been far from impressive. In the group stages they were in with Arsenal, whom they lost to home and away, Partizan Belgrade, with whom they drew 0-0 away, winning 5-1 at home, and MTK Hungaria, again drawing 0-0 away and winning 2-0 at home. Their second round performance against Celta was their most impressive, as they won home and away for a 5-0 aggregate, before overcoming Chelsea, then Stuttgart both on penalty shoot outs. They have an ageing team, and I think they will find it tough to live with our youngsters.

Yet of course we cannot afford to be complacement. We have had a quite brilliant season, winning the domestic treble unbeaten, and indeed we have only lost one match all season, and that was in Copenhagen. There are few teams anywhere, at any time who can boast such a record. Yet it will all be in vain if we fail to win tonight. Therefore, we simply can't fail. Winning tonight would make us the stuff of legends, a team not only of all Scots, but also for the large part born and raised around the Forfar area. It would be such an inredible feat, that I think we would be the greatest club side of all time. And the team is still very young, its frightening what we can achieve here. We have only one change to our regular line up, as Scott Adams is suspended, but John Foley is a more than adequate back up.

Come on kids, we have the opportunity to be legends, and you know what they say, third time lucky!

The Line Ups

Kiev: (5-3-2) Maciej Nalepa (35); Volodymyr Kryvosheev (24), Sergiy Federov (38), Goran Gavrancic (34), Matteo Mariotti (27), Andriy Nesmachnyi (34); Georgi Peev (34), Yuriy Bakum (21), Badr El Kadouri (32); Artem Milevskiy (28), Oleg Venglinskyi (35) Subs: Andriy Kovalenko (GK) (28), Michael Keane (16), Volodymyr Kretov (23), Olexandr Yatsenko (28), Oleg Mazur (19), Olexandr Petrov (16), Kenji Tanaka (21)

Forfar: (4-3-3) David Shearer (19); Scott McKeown (20), Declan Lawless (19), David Barker (20), Paul O'Neill (23); Kevin McMillan (21), Ross Kelly (23), John Foley (19); Steven Murray (25), Alan MacDonald (24), Scott Craig (19) Subs: Mark Williamson (GK) (23), Craig Campbell (25), David Davidson (23), John Ferguson (24), Andy Fraser (20), John Ross (19), Tony Murphy (19)

shannon2007

First Half

Yet despite all the hype that perhaps Kiev weren't so good, we still knew we would have to go out and perform at our best if we weren't to fall flat on our faces, and be left in tears once more. And indeed, it was the Ukranian side who were to get off to the brighter start, and after just 16 minutes, David Barker picked up a yellow card for a puch on Milevskiy. But as the half wore on, we seemed to have weathered the early storm, and if truth be told, for all their efforts, Kiev had threatened little.

The first real chance of the match came on 22 minutes, as Kevin McMillan raced away down the right, his cross being headed away by Gavrancic, but only as far as Paul O'Neill, who set up Kelly just outside the area. Kelly's shot though was rushed, and off target, but at least we had finally made the Ukranians worried.

Two minutes later Oleg Veglinskyi managed to get in behind the defence, and looked certain to give Kiev the lead, until Declan Lawless got back to make a world class tackle, and save the day. It was a real chance for the Ukranians, and the expression on their faces told the story, they knew they should have been ahead.

But the weren't ahead, and as the match wore on, we were starting to come to terms with occassion, and with 29 minutes gone Kelly had another half chance which just went over the bar. We were starting to dominate now, and a goal looked inevitable, and when it did come, it was the simplest you could get. David Barker took a throw on the level of the 18 yard line, towards Steven Murray, and as the Kiev defence stood still, Murray bulleted a header beyond their keeper, and we were ahead.

It was almost two nil when MacDonld tried to lob the keeper, but his shot came back off the post, anf Nalepa gratefully fell on the ball and that chance was gone. Shortly thereafetr, the referee blew for half time, and we went in ahead, and happy. But we knew there was still another 45 minutes to go, and we have been in better positions than this and gone on to lose. The match is far from over....

retired_brinker317

Yas - COME ONE FORFAR.

This is excellent PM, a real inspiration. I'm wondering what sort of players my Woking 'Good Facilities' will turn out over the summer - if they are half as good as some of yours, we should be in for a good future :thup:

retired_embartl

To the tune of Sol Solid Crew's song:

got 2700 seconds to go, 2700 seconds to go!

retired_bbcarr

COME ONE FORFAR

retired_beautybodee

Come on boys.......this is the time to show the world who Forfar are.

shannon2007

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by displaced_seagull:
Yas - COME ONE FORFAR.

This is excellent PM, a real inspiration. I'm wondering what sort of players my Woking 'Good Facilities' will turn out over the summer - if they are half as good as some of yours, we should be in for a good future :thup:<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If you can get two players a year that can play in the first team, I reckon thats doing well. Some of the players that came through our ranks that are now playing, almost certainly wouldn't have gotten a game if I'd been signing players.(Thats not to say they don't deserve their place.) And of course realistically, they shouldn't all be in the Scotland squad In fact, Rivaldo said Steven Murray wasn't good enough for the club. Good job I didn't listen to him then!

Actually thats one thing I would say, don't listen to your coaches advice on your youth, judge them by how they play.

shannon2007

Second Half

The dressing room was a mixture of emotions. Delighted as we were to be ahead, we were perfectly aware that we had been two up on Manchester United and had lost out. We could be forgiven for feeling more than a little cautious at this stage. Yet the fact was, Kiev, good as they must be to have reached the Final, are not Manchester United, or Bayern Munich. Indeed, we have beaten far better sides on our European adventures, and if we were being honest, we were now in the position to go on and win the match. I would be most upset if we didn't.

As the second half started, we expected Kiev to come rushing at as, but the truth is the first few seconds of play were scrappy, as both sides lost possession, before the ball finally fell to Kevin McMillan, who tried to play a forward ball for Craig, but the ball struck Mariotti, preventing a clean pass. Scott Craig though was quicker to react than the Kiev defence, picking up the lose ball, and advancing to the edge of the area, before firing in a superb shot that gave the keeper no chance, and for the second time in a Champions League Final, we were two ahead.

Surely now we had done enough to finally get our hands on that trophy, and yet I couldn't help wondering if perhaps we hadn't scored too early. This is still a very young team, and nerves may well play a part in the closing stages. It only takes one mistake to turn the game on its head, and give Kiev the lifeline they really don't deserve.

And indeed, just four minutes later, El Kadouri hammered a fantastic shot at goal, that beat Shearer. Unluckly for the Kiev player though, the ball whacked off the crossbar and Shearer was able to mop up the rebound, and I suddenly started to believe that just perhaps we were on the verge now.

Kiev were starting to wilt, as Kevin McMillan blasted a shot over the bar, and then on the hour mark the same player had a decent effort saved by Napela. The Ukranians were trying to hang on for dear life, as we looked to finish the match off, but time was passing so slowly, and we just wanted to hear that final whistle that refused to come.

A couple of minutes later, after a superb period of possesion from us, McMillan saw another chance go begging, as his effort went wide, but it was thrilling to see the winger getting so involved in the game. Kiev made a couple of changes to try and rescue the game, Mariotti amd Yatsenko came off the be replaced by Tanaka and Federov. I decided to stick with the same eleven, as to be honest they were all playing so well, I couldn't see who I could take off.

Just four minutes after the substitions, Kiev had another great chance, but Shearer brilliantly saved Venglinski's shot. A couple of minutes later, it was Nalepa's turn to make a save, this time from John Foley, and you certainly couldn't say this game lacked excitment, and as the time slowly ticked away, we found ourselves just eighteen minutes from glory, as Kiev threw in their final card, taking off Bakum, and bringing on Kretov.

With 15 minutes left, McKeown had a great chance for the third, but his shot was only just over the bar. And time was ticking slowly and inexorably away, as our moment of triumph grew ever closer and closer. Eight minutes left, and as Kiev seemed to have sucuumbed to the inevitable, we won a corner which McMillan play to Craig, who in turn nicely set Murray up, but once more Napela was there to make the save.

Time ticked away, and without knowing it we had finally reached the 89th minute, and surely now our impossible dream had been realised. McKeown sent a nice ball forward to Murray, who found the inspirational McMillan on the right as we looked to play out time. McMillan brought the ball forward, then played a glorious cross into the area that Scott Craig rose majestically to meet, powering his header towards the goal, and as the ball looped into the net, the dream had been realised.

We had to wait what seemed like an eternity of the three minutes of added time, before the referee finally brought the match to and end, and amidst emotional scenes of direct contrast to our last two Champions League Final's, we had completed a season of absolute perfection. The impossible had happened, and in a day and age when football is ruled by the money men, Forfar Athletic had stunned the world by winning the Champions League, with a team that had cost nothing, that the money men would understand at least.

Yet as we celebrated as no team had ever celebrated before, the season was still not over, as we still had two more World Cup qualifiers, plus of course the Confederations Cup. But for now, we had only one though in mind. To get totally plastered!

retired_bbcarr

YAS! brilliant effort, PM :thup: