Dalbeattie Star boss takes positives out of Lowland League defeat to Celtic youngsters

Dalbeattie Star boss Chris Jardine says there were positives to take from Saturday’s defeat to Celtic youngsters.

The Islecroft side had trailed 4-0 at one stage before a couple of late goals put a fairer reflection on the game.

Jardine said: “We were happy with quite a lot of it. I’m really glad we got those two goals at the end because I never felt it was a 4-0 game at any point.

“We were decent for long spells. There was a spell in the first half for maybe 15 minutes where they scored a poor goal from our point of view and we sat off them for 10 or 15 minutes. They caused us a lot of problems and we could maybe have gone in more than two down.

“We recovered at half-time, changed things, put Dylan Cairnie up top with Ross Irving, got more bodies forward and caused them a lot of problems second half. They changed their shape to cope with it.

“You don’t like losing games but there were a lot of positives and I was really proud of the performance they put in. I was really glad we got those two goals to put a fairer reflection on the game.”

Celtic took the lead when Johnny Kenny’s effort crossed the line with a bit of help from the woodwork and Star defender Jack Dickinson, a tremendous strike from Owen Moffat doubling the advantage.

Lewis Sloan was desperately unlucky to see his tremendous volley hit the post as Star looked for a way back into the game in the second half, Dickinson’s header being cleared off the line.

However, hopes of Star mounting a comeback were dashed when Adam Brooks got Celtic’s third, the same player quickly adding a fourth to kill things off.

Star rallied late on with goals from Dan Orsi and Russell Currie ensuring the scoreline painted a more accurate picture of proceedings.

Star’s hopes of