East of Scotland Premier League, Saturday 3rd February 2007

Easthouses Lily 1 Whitehill Welfare 2

Nine-man Lily were dealt a cruel blow in injury time when visitors Whitehill Welfare gained all three points after a hard fought derby.

Welfare began this game without their twin strikeforce of Wayne McIntosh and Nicky Walker who were red-carded against Ormiston. Whitehill enjoyed all of the early possession and were awarded a penalty in the 16th minute. Andy Doig made no mistake to put Welfare ahead.

In the second half, Easthouses came back into the game and had Welfare on the back foot for the first fifteen minutes with Swain producing a fine stop to keep out a close range header from David Beattie in 58 minutes.

Easthouses were reduced to ten men in the 60th minute when Love was sent packing after receiving his second yellow card. In the 65th minute, Swain brought down Beattie in the penalty area and the striker picked himself up to send the penalty high into the net for the equaliser.

The home side then pressed self-destruct when Ferrie was red-carded in the 73rd minute after also receiving a second caution. Easthouses came under severe pressure and looked set to hold out, but with the game into added time at the end of 90 minutes, a Pryde corner kick was forced home at the back post by Kevin Lee with the home side and their supporters claiming desparately that the ball had been handled. The ref waved aside the appeals and Welfare secured a vital three points to keep themselves in the mix for the League title race.

Easthouses Lily: Weir, McGlashan, Love, Cameron, Edgar, Sives, McMillan, Ferrie, Beattie, Neilson, Moffat. Subs: Smith, Currie, Conlon, Richardson.

Whitehill Welfare: Swain, Cornett, Lee, Johnstone, Woodburn, Wilkie, Christie, Pryde, Malone, Doig, McDonaghue. Subs: Hart, Carlin, McEwan, Stewart, McKenna.

Above: Andy Christie in the thick of the action.