SUBSTITUTE Stephen Dobbie was on the pitch for barely a minute when his low effort from an angle squeezed into the net, a goal that had his coach, Gordon Chisholm, struggling to contain his delight at such tactical acumen.
QUEEN OF SOUTH 3 Dobbie 65, 74, 85
MORTON 0
Ten minutes later Dobbie struck again, thumping a 20-yarder into the corner, and he added a late header to complete a 20-minute hat-trick. If only all tactical substitutions produced such a perfect
reward – one with the left, one with the right, one with the head.
Morton had a couple of excellent early chances, but a combination of acrobatic goalkeeping and dire finishing foiled them. How on earth Iain Russell missed the target with only Queens goalkeeper Jamie McDonald in front of him is anyone's guess. The striker looked suitably contrite as he replayed the sitter in his mind.
McDonald had earlier shown fine agility in turning Jamie Stevenson's 12-yarder for a corner as the visitors struggled to get out of their own half.
Chisholm's men were a bit more purposeful in the latter stages of the first half, a period that also threw up some jittery home defending. You sensed that if a goal was ever going to arrive then it would do so courtesy of a mistake, and that is what almost happened just after the hour mark. Morton defender Gordon MacGregor was woefully short with a pass back, but John Stewart's lob over the advancing goalkeeper missed the target by a mile.
Stewart was immediately replaced by Dobbie, and the points were soon on their way south.
The full article contains 276 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
