Bonnyrigg Rose...................5

Sauchie Juniors...................0

East of Scotland League, Conference B

IAIN DIACK was scathing in his assessment of his Sauchie side as they suffered their worst defeat of the season on Saturday.

The Reds had more than matched runaway league leaders Bonnyrigg Rose in the opening period and were level at half time.

But, a second half collapse saw Diack's men blown away by a five-goal salvo to leave the manager fuming.

He told Advertiser Sport: "We picked the worst possible time to have our worst performance of the season: when playing against the best team.

"We never really got out of second gear the whole day, but did compete well in the first half.

"Going in at half time, we were thinking the game was in the balance.

"However, there was a complete lack of energy and we failed to press the ball.

"We got what we deserved and that was a tanking."

Things could have been even worse for Sauchie with Darren Dolan pulling off a couple of impressive saves and the hosts missing a penalty.

The result saw the Reds drop to fourth in the table with rivals Bo'ness and Crossgates making up ground in the hunt for promotion.

And Diack was left perplexed as to what caused the awful second half showing.

He said: "We just never came out in the second half at all and showed no fight or desire.

"I don't want to accuse the boys of not working hard, but there was something missing from them.

"Anyone watching that second 45 minutes would not have believed it's the same side who have done so well this season.

"I don't really know what happened in the second half. It wasn't just one or two players, it was all of them.

"We just went into a bit of a shell after they scored an early goal and they got a lift.

"It's not a lack of effort and I can't really put my finger on it, we just didn't come out with the same focus.

"We've beaten teams who are on a par with Bonnyrigg this season and that makes it all the more disappointing."

Sauchie welcome Fife side Burntisland to Beechwood Park on Saturday and Diack made it clear he was likely to make a number of changes to his starting 11.

Whoever does come in though, he demanded they bounce back in style to the hammering.

He added: "The beauty of football is that we have a chance to rectify this as quickly as possible.

"There will be changes to the team as you would expect after such a performance.

"Something missing on Saturday was our workrate for one another and that's something that has to come back against Burntisland."