THE 1997 GAME - NEW!

Scotland's Traynor Hat-trick Humbles England

SCOTLAND 5         ENGLAND 2
Traynor 3, Pratt,    Lord, Roper
Donaldson.

Al Sadd Stadium
23 April 1997

AT the end of a proverbial "game of two halves", a Pat Traynor inspired Scotland team celebrated their victory in style as a demoralised England team trudged forlornly away from Al Sadd having been outfought, out-thought, and completely outplayed by a gritty Scotland side.

Traynor's hat-trick was the icing on a hefty Scottish cake while England, 2-1 winners in the 1996 match, were left to dine on humble pie.

To be fair the Scot's had the better of the conditions as they rightly chose to use the unrelenting breeze to their advantage in the opening 40 minutes when hearts were bigger and legs were stronger and fresher. England came back well from 4-0 down at the interval, and clawed themselves back to 4-2 before Traynor completed his hat-trick and settled Scottish nerves.

The strength of the wind was seen early on when England keeper Les Franklin almost scored with what would have been a very bizarre goal. Clearing his lines he ballooned the ball high into the air, but it altered its trajectory high in the atmosphere and dropped menacingly back to earth behind him, bounced on the ground and mercifully for Franklin over the crossbar!

Just five minutes into the match Traynor opened the scoring to put Scotland in front, stabbing home Rooney's pass. The goal was just reward for early Scots pressure which had already seen a Donaldson header hit the England crossbar as they were forced constantly onto the back foot.

In a rare England foray into Scottish territory, John Lord surged past Scotland's Alan Haggerty only to be dumped unceremoniously to the ground which resulted in the Scot to become the first player booked. From the free kick England were almost celebrating an equaliser but Tim Emerson's clever effort rebounded off the post.

Half an hour into the match Scotland increased their lead when after a sustained period of pressure Pat Traynor latched onto a fine Kevin McKinley through ball to fire past Franklin.

The trickle then became an avalanche. Pratt buried Scotland's third taking advantage of uncertainty in the English defence. A few minutes later Graeme Donaldson scored their fourth, heading in unchallenged from a free-kick caused by Jarman's clumsy challenge on Pratt. To add insult to injury Jarman was booked for his troubles.

Half-time: Scotland 4  England 0

Four goals in arrears at the interval, no-one gave England any hope; but someone obviously forgot to tell the English lads that their day was over because right from the restart they swarmed all over Scotland's goal. Within two minutes they were rewarded when John Lord pulled one back with a fine shot from the right hand side of the area. And he was rapidly becoming a thorn on the left side of the Scots defence and should have added a second from an almost identical position after being put clear by Colin Wooley, but scooped his shot wide.

In fact the Scotland team were indebted to Keith Jeffels for a string of saves which kept the English at bay. Howver the keeper was at fault for England's second goal when he dropped a cross allowing Phil Roper to reduce the deficit to two.

As the game wore on and legs got wearier, England left thmselves exposed at the back and Scotland's Traynor and Steve Reid took advantage. Reid cleverly danced through the English defence only to see his effort come rebounding off the post. However, it fell into the path of Traynor who tucked away his third and Scotland's fifth. The Scots in the crowd erupted in sheer joy as ther was no way back now for England.

Scotland: Jeffels, Clarke, Donaldson, Brandie, McCrory, Langridge, Pratt, Haggarty, McKinlay, Traynor, Rooney. Subs: Reid, Brown and Lewis.

Scotland's Man of the Match was Pat Traynor.

England: Franklin, McKenna, Jarman, Roper, Wink, Wooley, Armstrong, Lockwood, Emerson, Lord, Craig. Subs: Pearson, Stewart and Snook.

England's Man of the Match was Dean Snook.