Forfar West End 0-3 Monifieth

Forfar West End 0-3 Monifieth

Pre-Season Friendly

Monday 17th July 2023

Up in Dundee for a couple of days and with not much better to do on a Monday night, I decided to delve right into the midsts of obscurity and take in this game between Forfar West End and Monifieth.

It didn’t cost anything as it was free entry (always a bonus) and it didn’t cost anything on the bus from Dundee either as I’d already bought an Angus Dayrider bus ticket earlier in the day, so I could explore the local area.

For those that don’t know, there are actually three football clubs which are based in Forfar.

The one which everyone will have heard of, Forfar Athletic, play in the SPFL and are currently in League Two having been a permanent fixture in the bottom two leagues of Scottish professional football throughout the past three decades. Then there are Forfar United who literally play just down the road from Forfar West End - and they’re both members of the Midland Division. 

All three grounds are within easy reach of one another given that Forfar is one of those quaint little towns you could walk right the way around in about 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, to my understanding, Monifieth are only an amateur team based nearer to Dundee - although on the evidence of this game they could certainly hold their own in the Midland Division.

And that’s because it really was a night to forget for West End as they didn’t take any of the chances they created, were second-best, and ended up being very comfortably beaten.

Playing a separate side in each half, it was the Monifieth team wearing red shirts who opened the scoring midway through the first half when one of their strikers picked up the ball inside the box and drilled a low effort past the Forfar ‘keeper.

And after the break, the Monifieth team in sky blue shirts doubled the lead around the hour mark in an incident which left the young West End ‘keeper raging. 

A curling shot this time hit the underside of the bar, clipped the post and rolled across the line and the ball was probably going into the net anyway, before it was slammed home by a Monifieth striker in a clear offside position. No flag was forthcoming despite plenty of appeals and so it was 2-0… leaving the young ‘keeper despondent, angry and frustrated by pretty much everything - but who could blame him!

With a couple of minutes left to play they won a penalty after the visitors’ second half ‘keeper deliberately brought down the Forfar striker who was looking to go round him after being put clean through. In a competitive game, the foul would have been punished by a card (possibly even a red one); instead nothing was forthcoming and low and behold when the resulting spot-kick was taken, he guessed correctly and saved it.

And if Forfar thought their night couldn’t get any worse, right at the end of the game, Monifieth managed to bag a third goal; too much time and space once again being afforded inside the box and being punished in the most devastating fashion.

Unfortunately, there were no team-sheets (not that I’d expect one anyway) and I couldn’t get the team lines either so I can’t attribute names to scorers, etc, but on the positive side the weather held off and it was decent to ‘do something’ on what would have been an otherwise boring Monday night.

All credit to the fantastic Scottish Football Fixtures website for making me aware that the game was on - an invaluable resource when it comes to planning many trips to Scotland.