Ayr United 0
Clyde 1
Scottish Cup (Third Round)

Match Report

The Bully Wee booked their place in the last 16 of the Scottish Cup today, as Barry Cuddihy’s early goal was enough to see off Championship side Ayr United at a sunny Somerset Park.

With this afternoon’s game coming just over 41 hours after kick-off at Bayview on Thursday evening – the shortest time between two Clyde competitive matches since 1969, Danny Lennon continued to rotate his squad and made six changes to the team, including Lloyd Robertson in the starting line-up for the first time this calendar year.

Clyde opened the scoring in the 4th minute when Ross Cunningham beat Michael Miller on the left wing and cut inside to have a shot. His effort was blocked but Barry Cuddihy was first to react, and prodded the ball high into the net from the six-yard box.

The hosts had a chance to hit back soon after when a corner was cleared to the edge of the box and a subsequent shot took a big deflection, but David Mitchell was able to save.

At the other end Lewis Jamieson got in behind the Ayr defence but his effort was smothered by Viljami Sinisalo, and the ‘keeper also saved Cuddihy’s follow up.

Mark McKenzie had two good chances to bring The Honest Men level, but shot wide whilst through on goal after dispossessing Scott Rumsby, and then blazed over from a similar position after a counter attack.

The Bully Wee should have went into interval two goals up when Jamieson again ran clear of the defence and could have squared to Lloyd Robertson in a better position but chose to go himself and was blocked by a last-ditch tackle from a home defender.

Mitchell made a superb save early on in the second half, sticking out his leg to stop a powerful shot on target from Michael Moffat.

The Bully Wee restricted Ayr to minimal clear cut chances for the remainder of the second half, though Kevin Nicoll threw his body in to made a vital block after a goalmouth stramash, and Jack Thomson followed this later with a perfectly timed last ditch tackle to prevent Luke McCowan from going through one-on-one with Mitchell.

Match report written by Clyde FC