Sunday 27th July, 2014 at 6:38pm
Thistle travelled to Belfast for their fourth full pre-season fixture and it was to prove an eventful match to say the least.
With the first half starting in entertaining fashion it’s fair to say that Glentoran probably had the better of the early exchanges. It was Thistle though that arguably carved out the first real chance.
Ryan Stevenson shaped to blast a free kick from all of 40 yards but instead produced a clever chipped free kick that found Christie Elliott who battled with the Glentoran keeper, Elliott Morris, and ultimately got the better of him. Elliott managed to get a shot away and might have opened the scoring had it not been for a brave bit of last minute defending.
Glentoran continued to press as the game went on though and, on nine minutes, a great cross from Miskimmin brought a brave save from Gallacher as he went down to collect at the feet of the onrushing striker.
This was followed by another Glentoran chance five minutes later when the home team again broke in numbers after a missed challenge from Balatoni. However, the resulting shot was well over the bar.
As the half went on Thistle began to find their feet in the game and, on 35 minutes, the break came. The Glentoran defence got themselves into a muddle and, after their initial clearance bounced off one of their own defenders, Kris Doolan was there to slot the ball into the back of the net.
As the half drew to a close Glentoran were given the opportunity to draw level as they were awarded a dubious looking penalty for a handball by McMillan. Jordan Stewart stepped up for Glentoran and placed the ball to Gallacher’s left to even up the score.
If the first half was good for footballing reasons the second will be remembered for anything but the football.
An early chance came for the Glasgow team as Stevenson put a cross in. Balatoni connected with it but, if anything got too much on it and the ball ended up over the bar.
That was probably the best of the chances before tempers began to fray. A very late challenge on Gary Fraser which, on another day might have seen a straight red, was what sparked things off.
Five minutes later Fra McCaffery took exception to Higginbotham’s challenge and went to start some afters with him. For a few minutes the ref struggled to maintain control but things duly settled down and play resumed.
After the handbags were cleared away the two teams played out an uneventful 10 minutes before Gary Fraser picked up the ball deep into the opposition half and hit a shot from 25 yards. Although not of the same calibre as his strike against Hearts last season a deflection guided the ball into the bottom corner.
Kallum Higginbotham rounded off the scoring converting a late penalty with a cheeky dinked effort into the bottom corner after Duggan was tripped just inside the Glentoran area.
