‘Loons’ head back to Livingston

Forfar Athletic will head back to the Tony Macaroni Stadium next Tuesday evening after last night’s Irn Bru cup tie against Livingston Colts was abandoned after 71 minutes due to fading light after a power outage in the vicinity of the stadium cut off the complete supply just before kick-off.

Apart from the lack of floodlighting on a fairly dull evening, there was only emergency lighting available in the ground with no pa system or for that matter showers available to the players at the end of the contest.

Referee David Dickinson made the difficult call at halftime to continue with the action after a truncated interval of just under ten minutes, knowing however that unless power was restored which was unlikely according to reports suggesting a four-hour repair task, there was little chance of the game finishing and so it proved.

The home side would feel hard done by having had much the upper hand in the first period against a sluggish Forfar side, deservedly taking the lead through an excellent strike on the half-hour mark from Adam Watson.

The Athies with five changes from their starting line up at Dumbarton came more into the game in the second period, John Baird and Dylan Easton testing home custodian Jordan Pettigrew.

Next Tuesday’s second attempt to complete the ninety minutes will again kick-off at 7.45p.m. and both clubs have agreed that admission will be free.

Apologies to the Forfar fans who made the trip over the Forth last night, but the circumstances that prevailed were well out with the control of the host club.

Forfar lined up – Muir, Meechan, Kelly, Munro, Travis, Reilly(Coupe) Bain, MacKintosh, Fraser, Baird, Easton

Subs not used – Malone, Whyte, Kennedy, Starkey, Allan

The draw for the second round of the competition takes place at 1 p.m. on Thursday.

A selection of photographs from the match is available here.