This evening Carluke welcomed local rivals Royal Albert to the John Cumming Stadium for this West of Scotland League match. Both teams still harboured hopes of winning the league and so a decent crowd was in attendance for the match.

The game turned out to be a cagey affair in the first half with not much in the way of goalmouth action. The first real attempt at goal came in the 10th minute when a 20 yard shot from Albert’s Scott Nicol warmed the hand of Eoin Wallace in the Rovers goal.

The best chance of the first half fell the way of Carluke when a freekick from the left was flighted to the back post in the 30th minute. It was headed back across goal and after a brief scramble the ball fell to Chris Kelly. The midfielder snatched at his shot from 10 yards and it flew over the bar.

Ten minutes later another freekick for The Rovers found Ben Rennie but his shot could only find the side netting. This was the last of the action and both sides went in with the game evenly poised at 0-0.

The second half got underway and with so little between the teams the first goal was going to be crucial. Unfortunately for Carluke it fell to Royal Albert when The Rovers failed to adequately deal with a clearance. The ball was crossed back into the box and there was Mackenzie Shields to nod the ball into the bottom corner to make the score 0-1 to Royal Albert.

In a game of so few chances the match was effectively ended when only 2 minutes later an almost carbon copy goal was scored from a throw in on the right this time by Aaron Bulloch. 0-2 to Albert.

Carluke continued to fight and made several changes to try and get a foothold back in the game but never really threatened Albert, although they were starting to enjoy more possession and territory.

The game was effectively over in the 75th minute with more clinical finishing from Royal Albert. A freekick into the front post wasn’t cleared and was knocked in from close range by David Collins to make the score 0-3. Carluke continued to try and get at least a consolation goal but it was not forthcoming and in the end Royal Albert ran out comfortable winners 0-3.

This Saturday Carluke play Campbeltown Pupils for a second Saturday in a row, this time at the John Cumming Stadium and will hope to get back on winning ways after a comfortable vistory against the same team last Saturday. Kickoff is at 2pm.

Photography by Kevin Ramage