League Leaders Hit Saints For Six
- Winning In The Rain
- May 4
- 5 min read
Saturday 3rd May 2025
Scottish Premier Amateur Football Association
Premiership
Oban Saints 0 - 6 Steins Thistle
Glencruitten 2
Mossfield Avenue
Oban
Argyll
PA34 4EH
Referee Mr Jimmy Litster
League leaders Steins Thistle hit Oban Saints for six at Glencruitten last Saturday afternoon to cement their position at the top of the Scottish Premier Amateur Football Association Premiership table. With the East of Scotland Cup already on the mantlepiece, the Allandale men have their sights set firmly on the league and the Scottish Amateur Cup to complete a remarkable treble.
Saints' Manager Ross Maitland welcomed back David Beaton, Aidan Jackson, Connor Moore and Skipper Scott Maitland but even with this added experience the young D&K Lafferty Contractors and MKM Oban Building Supplies side never looked likely to derail the Steins juggernaut.
One notable absentee was Mr Oban Saints himself David Buchanan. The Club Secretary, who has missed only a handful of games in over fifty years, was severely under the weather and everybody connected with the Club wishes him a speedy recovery.
Saints lined up with Graham Douglas in goal behind a back four of Shaye Black, Aidan Jackson, Ben Forbes and Keiron Lopez. Across the midfield were Donald Campbell, Aaron McKay and Captain Scott Maitland. Up front, Connor Moore led the line flanked by Rhys Millar and David Beaton. On the substitutes bench were Connor Beattie, Oran Bryce, Alec McInroy, Matty Pollock and goalkeeper Craig Maitland.
The match kicked-off in warm sunshine with Saints attacking the railway line end in the first half. After an even opening five minutes the visitors began to exert some pressure, and Saints were indebted to goalkeeper Graham Douglas for two excellent saves to deny Dylan McCafferty and Michael Wallace.
Douglas' opposite number Calum Gray had missed the reverse fixture at Allandale a month earlier due to his involvement with the Scottish Amateur Football Association Select and the big keeper was instrumental in the opening goal. Gray's long ball out to the left from his eighteen-yard line saw Dylan McCafferty get between Shaye Black and Aidan Jackson and pick out Michael Wallace on the six-yard line to squeeze the ball past Graham Douglas.
Saints' best chance of the first half came in the twenty-second minute from a long Aidan Jackson throw-in. Dean Manson headed the ball out of the Steins' box where Scott Maitland kept the danger alive picking out Ben Forbes on the eighteen-yard line. Forbes' clever backheel sent David Beaton scurrying to the goal line from where he did well to send a cutback to the near post for the arrival of Donald Campbell who placed his finish inches wide of target under pressure from Finlay Miller and Dean Manson.
The visitors continued to carry the greater threat in the attacking third and forced a number of corner kicks which, despite a height mismatch, Saints defended well. When Michael Wallace's delivery from the corner flag eventually did find a teammate giant centre-half Dean Manson made a solid connection but sent his header over the Saint's crossbar.
Saints looked utilise Connor Moore's pace and hit on the counter-attack but, as the half wore on, Moore became increasingly isolated. When sent through by Keiron Lopez the Saints' top marksman finally looked to have the better of the Steins' back line only for Referee Jimmy Litster, who had a good game, to give the benefit of an extremely tight offside decision to the visitors.
Ross Maitland sent his troops out for the second half demanding a similarly well-disciplined defensive performance as the first forty-five minutes. That plan however lasted only eleven minutes before the visitors doubled their advantage. Having previously safely gathered a dead ball effort from Andrew McGown, Graham Douglas showed too much of his goal to Dylan McCafferty who didn't need a second invitation to find the bottom corner with an arrowed free-kick from just outside the Saints' eighteen-yard box.
All of the earlier good defensive work was undone on the hour mark when nobody in the Saints' back four took charge of a speculative ball over the top with John Harrison able to steal in and smuggle the ball to Dylan McCafferty who curled a delightful left foot finish into the top corner from eighteen yards.
Saints' Gaffer Ross Maitland made a double substitution after sixty-four minutes sending on Connor Beattie and Matty Pollock to replace Connor Moore and Shaye Black, but the change did nothing to turn the tide and Dylan McCafferty completed his ten minute hat-trick slotting home after Saints were too easily outfought by Andrew McGown and John Harrison.
With twenty minutes remaining Saints lost the services of young Donald Campbell to an achilles injury with his place being taken by Alec McInroy.
Steins' goalkeeper Calum Gray had his quiet afternoon in the Glencruitten sunshine interrupted in the seventy-second minute when David Beaton broke through from a deep Graham Douglas free-kick. Gray pushed Beaton's effort behind for a corner-kick on the Saints' right which he safely gathered.
David Beaton was sent through again two minutes later, but this time couldn't escape the close attentions of Dean Manson who ushered the ball back to Gray who launched another Steins' attack. Michael Wallace powered away from Keiron Lopez on the Steins' right and swung over a cross to the back post. Graham Douglas parried down John Harrison's header and watched in horror as they bounce took the ball out of his reach and straight onto the forehead of Kyle Allison who nodded home goal number five.
Oran Bryce was Saints' final change of the afternoon when he replaced Rhys Millar with eleven of the regulation ninety minutes remaining.
The visitors rounded off the scoring in the eighty-second minute when Andrew McGown got the better of Matty Pollock on the Steins' left and dug out a left foot cross which Graham Douglas tried and failed to claw away with substitute Gianni De Luca piling in at the back post to head home from point blank range.
This coming Saturday Saints have a break from league duties and will travel to Battery Park Greenock to face old friends and rivals Greenock High School Former Pupils in the first round of the Scottish Premier Amateur Football Association Cinema Cup.
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