THE crack young Lothian & Edinburgh Amateur FA side, Redhall Star, have it all to do after being held to a 2-2 draw by the visiting side from Bearsden, Stedfast, in a tough Scottish Amateur Cup clash at Redhall Park.

The wonderful Redhall committee were out early on Saturday morning preparing their pitch at the park in Longstone and it looked in very good condition, indeed, following the heavy rain of the preceding few days.

From the outset, as expected, it was the young home players who dominated the game, with the experienced Stedfast defenders pushed to the limit to keep Redhall from opening the scoring. The visitors were aided and abetted, however, by the woeful shooting of the home side. Chance after chance was missed in the first half by Star with a very brave Stedfast keeper, Craig McPherson, in outstanding form.

The home side lost top scorer, Steven Bell in the 8th minute but they still played their trade-mark passing football and it took a great save from McPherson to deny Chris Smith the opener. It was all one-way traffic and only occasionally did Stedfast break the stranglehold. When they did, the team from Bearsden looked to be a good outfit, but they were not in the same class as Redhall Star.

John McDonald fired a tremendous shot at the Stedfast goal from the left as the pressure mounted, but Star just could not stick the ball in the back of the net. Smith fired another effort from a good position over the Stedfast bar, then the outstanding Dean Thornhill was off target with another shot. Cross after cross in to the visiting goalmouth failed to produce an opening goal, then McPherson showed great awareness to come off his line quickly to smother a shot in a 1-to1 with Jonas Johansson. Craig Lynes did have the ball in the net, but referee Gordon Suttie, chalked the goal off for offside to the frustration of the Redhall players. It was just one of many decisions that went against Redhall in this game, however.

A few minutes before the half-time break, the long overdue goal for Redhall finally came, with Kenny Fisher, reacting the quickest to knock home a loose ball in the Stedfast goalmouth to make it 1-0.

The visiting side attacked straight away after the ball was re-centred and the Star goal was under threat for a change. The play switched to the other end and a good shot was Smith was confidently held by McPherson. Then it was the turn of home keeper, Liam McGowan, to show how alert he was in a raid on the Redhall goal, but it was still only 1-0 for the home outfit at the break.

The team from Bearsden had much more of the game at the start of the second half, with Nicky Clarke looking a very dangerous player on the right flank for Stedfast. The danger signs were there for Redhall and as the tempo of the game increased, they had to work extra hard to halt attacks on their goal, but the home defence was unable to stop substitute David Fraser from firing a half-chance past McGowan to square the game at 1-1.

That shock goal appeared to act as a 'wake-up' call for the home combine and they laid siege to the Stedfast goal immediately after the restart and after great work by Smith on the edge of the box he created space for himself to hammer a brilliant shot low past McPherson to make it 2-1 for Redhall.

That goal came in the 65th minute and the visiting side lifted themselves again, making good breaks to test the resolve of the young Redhall defenders. In another incident in the second half, Johansson went down in the box but the match referee waved play on, eventually booking the home player for making comments. It was, therefore, a real sickener for the Redhall contingent when the match official awarded a penalty to Stedfast after Jay Hunter was adjudged to have fouled a Stedfast player in the box.

Steve Murray made an immaculate job to score from the spot-kick to bring the score to 2-2 and what a blistering finish that produced to this Scottish Cup clash.

Wonderful play from Thornhill ended with a superb ball in to the goalmouth, but somehow, McPherson and his defensive colleagues survived.

It was stunning cup football and when big Craig Lynes was cynically brought down in a break up the right, a Stedfast defender was sent packing. The almost relentless pressure continued on the Stedfast goal and, on any other day, Redhall would have scored a few more goals. But not in this game! The visiting side worked their socks off to ensure themselves another crack at the young Edinburgh outfit in Bearsden on Saturday with the final score 2-2.

Surprisingly, despite several stoppages in the second half, there was no time added on by the referee from Fife. Redhall are capable of going on to win a place in the fourth round of this, the biggest Scottish Cup event at this level of the game in Scotland but they need to score goals! The overall standard of play in the game at Redhall Park was magnificent and and all credit to both sides for producing a wonderful game of football.