Stirling Districts title hopes look dashed after only taking one point from two games within the space of five days.
A rescheduled match against the Adelaide Pumas was played at Grange on Tuesday evening with Coach Alan Evans expecting nothing less than a win. This however was not the case, with the match ending in a three all draw.
Stirling started the game on the front foot and continued to press in the opening 20 minutes, putting large amounts of pressure on the Pumas defence. This hard work was undone by a Pumas counter attack, which resulted in a free header into an open net. This however was quickly cancelled out as some good combination play on the left hand side from Adam and Ryan Gore, lead to R Gore’s cross being deflected into the top corner of the net. With Stirling’s defence looking increasingly shaky a second goal for the Pumas followed after the ball was not properly cleared. Stirling went into half time break at 2-2 thanks to a sublime volley from A Gore, after a pin point cross from a Matt Hawthorn free kick.
Mid-way through the second half the Pumas went ahead for a third time, this time via an unlucky own goal. Once again Stirling had to play catch up again and were unlucky not to level the scores after an incorrect offside call was awarded after the ball hit the back of the net. However with less than ten minutes remaining Sean Lang picked up the ball just inside the box and drove his shot past the keeper and into the roof of the net to levels the scores. Evans expected a much improved performance in the following match against the Vipers.
Stirling started the game against the Vipers with one of their strongest line-ups of the season and were looking to take all three points to remain near the top of the table. The game was played in two half’s, with the opening half dominated by the Vipers as they attacked downhill with the wind. The new defensive line up of Simon Dawe, Chris Winters, Ryan Gore and James Laughton soaked up large amounts of pressure as the home side looked for a way through. The Vipers persistence paid off half way through the half as a defensive error caused the ball to fall to the Vipers striker, who opportunistically took one touch and fired a shot over keeper Steve Jansen from 30 yards out. Going into the break Stirling knew they had to keep persisting in the second half knowing they were well in the game and would have the wind at their backs.
The second half was all Stirling with penetrating runs down both wings from Michael Henn and Adam Gore. The Vipers were able to absorb the constant bombardment from Stirling as they looked to play on the counter attack. Whilst Tim Cookes and Matt Hawthorn were pulling the strings in the midfield Sean Lang and Josh Lushington came close to levelling the score on a few occasions but to no avail. As the half wore on an injured Winters was replaced by Martin Nitschke as the tackles begun to fly in with an number of Vipers players coming off second best. With 20 minutes remaining A Gore received his first caution of the game after a miss timed challenge. Minutes later he received his marching orders after a dubious second yellow card. This caused a change in formation as Stirling still pushed for an equaliser. With every persistent attack, the threat of a counter attack from the Vipers remained a constant threat. Daniel Wilby replaced Henn in the closing stages and was soon launching one of his trademark long throws into the box which was inches away from being put into the net. A draw would have been a fair result as Stirling put in one of its better performances for quite some time, however that’s football. Stirling need to bounce back next week against the Red Blue Eagles at home.