4th June 2020. Heriot Watt University.1 Livingston United 0
A beautiful day today and I decided to head out to Whitburn for the King Cup final. The cup is now contested by teams below the East of Scotland Premier League and the final today is between Herriot Watt University and Livingston United. I was quite lucky as the X27 bus goes direct to Whitburn along the West Approach Road and I decided to catch the 12.03 bus which was scheduled to arrive in Whitburn about 13.30 ahead of the 14.00 kick-off. The journey was not too bad as we went out by Dalmahoy and then through Mid and East Calder. However once the bus got to Livingston things changed as we went through areas of LivinI had never heard of before. We finally hit both Almondvale and St Johns hospital before another magical mystery tour. After going through Seafield (not the one at Portobello) and Blackburn (not the Lancashire version) the bus finally arrived in Whitburn. I set my phone to let me know when we arrived at Whitburn Cross . Got of there and walked to the ground in East Main Street. £5 entry fee and £2 for a programme as I entered the ground. I met Jim in the ground and we stood on a grassy banking in brilliant sunshine to watch the game,
It was going to be a strange game today between two sides who finished in the lower half of their respective leagues. HWU finished eighth in the EoS Conference A while Live were seventh in Conference X which contained clubs who were late in moving into the senior ranks from the junior set-up. While I had seen HWU play before the only name I recognised in the current squad was Josh Wishart who I had previously seen play for Spartans. HWU manager Banji Koya has however been with the club as both a player and manager. Given he took over as manager for the 2916/17 season he m hat be among the longest serving managers in Scotland. Livi however were a complete mystery to me as I had ever seen them play before and did not recognise any names in the squad list in the programme,
It was a strange game to watch as I had no idea about the Livi side while HWU were wearing black numbers on a red strip which were difficult to make out. In the first half HWU were clearly the better side but their finishing was awful. Livi although have less of the ball created the two best chances. First Danny Kleinman chased a through ball as keeper Alex McMahon raced out from the penalty box. The pair collided just outside the bix but the forward managed to push the ball past the goalie towards the empty goal net. Centre back Ethan Kerr did really well to get back to clear the ball off the line. Then a cross from the left was completely missed by Danny Gould when it seemed that it would have been easier to head the ball into the goal.
The game changed in fifty minutes when Livingston centre back and captain Hassan Nyang was sent off. He challenged a HWU forward just outside the penalty box and the referee judged it as denting a clear goal scoring opportunity. I thought it was a foul but should have been a yellow rather than a red card. Nyang obviously agreed with me as he took several minutes to leave the pitch. With Livi down to ten men HWU had most of the game but their lack of a good striker let them down. Livi keeper Chris Ashley did however make two excellent saves with a divibpng stop to push a shoot from outside the box for a corner followed by an even better diving save to push away a header from a corner. The sent-off Nyang had now changed and was standing on the steps outside the dressing room shouting encouragement to his teammates and abuse at the match officials.
After the end of the ninety minutes the game went to extra time with the prospect of a penalty shoot-out if no goals. However in the last minute of the first half of extra time a low cross found Campbell Marr sliding in at the back post to give HWU the lead. There were loud protests of offside from the Livi players and management but with no VAR the goal stood. Te second half of extra time continued with HEU have the bulk of possession but no further goals.
On the final whistle the HWU side showed their excitement at having won the King Cup for the sevcondtime. While Alex and Jim decided to wait for the presentation I decided to head for a bus as my app showed an X18 due in five minutes. The X18 did not turn up but a FirstBus X22 came along. I got on with Ian, a fellow Jambo, and finally got home around 18.00 after another long journey involving insisting various parts of Livingston.
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