New Irvine Meadow boss Kevin Deeney had almost the perfect day yesterday.
He made the switch from interim boss to permanent in the afternoon, then his side bagged a late equaliser away to Auchinleck Talbot at night in the West of Scotland League Premier Division.
Connor Boyd opened the scoring for Medda just before the half hour mark to give them a 1-0 lead at half-time.
But Kyle Faulds was sent off reducing Deeney's side to 10 men in the 57th minute, and five minutes later Aaron Mason fired home a penalty to bring the sides level.
Ross Taylor then looked sure to have sealed three points for Talbot when he scored in the 82nd minute, but with five minutes to go, Cammy MacNair bundled over the line to grab his first goal in Medda colours.
Deeney took his players back to class as he dished them out homework on Saturday’s opponents Pollok – and a 2-0 win would class as a pass in any exam.
He boss watched his side defeat the title hopefuls, and he says he’d dished out instructions to players during the week so they knew what to work on.
And thanks to goals from Callum Graham and Ross Urquhart it was Medda who were top of the class.
Boss Deeney told the Irvine Herald: “We worked during the week on how Pollok would shape up against us and what we need to do to counter that.
“I can’t change everything, sometimes the players have got responsibility to recognise things that are happening on the park, so I had been reiterating that all week.
“It was about making sure they all knew how to deal with in-game management and how to solve problems, so we gave them the framework on how to deal with certain things.”
He continued: “You’re always conscious of not wanting to appear like a schoolteacher, there’s nothing worse of coming across like that when you have the tactics board out.
“It doesn’t have to be an hour-long session, it’s just 10 minutes or so saying ‘let’s put this in to practice’, it’s just basic stuff and it’s nothing new I’m telling them it’s just reminding these guys what they already know.”
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