Interview by Julian Tyley
Whitley began the new season with a 2-2 draw against Northallerton Town on a sunny but blustery afternoon at Hillheads. One goal down at half time, Whitley fought back strongly after the break with two goals in quick succession and seemed destined for victory but a last minute breakaway by the visitors resulted in an equaliser.
“It’s that old cliché, a game of two halves really”, was how assistant manager Barry Rizza summed up the encounter. “First half it didn’t click, it was stop start, stop start. We just couldn’t get into our flow, but I was happy with the reaction at half time and how we came out for the second half and showed some glimpses of real good football and created quite a lot of chances.”
Both of Whitley’s goals, a stunning volley from debutant Lennox Magalhaes and a powerful header from captain Michael Scott came in a five minute spell just before the hour mark. “They were two really good goals. I’m happy for young Lennox on his debut at home and to come and score like that; but not only that, his energy, his desire to get the ball and look to play forward. He’s a real good addition to the squad and I’m happy for him.”
Barry agreed that the late equaliser was “A bit of a kick in the teeth, a bit of switching off, especially the first goal, we switched off and were too spread out as a unit and then the second goal, we’ve broke, we could have kept the ball in the corner and created the two on one and created the overload. I’ve had this conversation with young Lennox, it’s risk against reward and then they’ve gone down the pitch and scored but in all I think a draw was a fair result.”
Summing up the performance he continued “if we’d finished the game as we started the first half I’d be very disappointed but I think we showed enough in the second half to come out and create chances, get shots on goal and score two goals. It’s going to take time to gel but we’ll get there. The reaction at half time was good; what was good we got the answers from them.”
Facing a last minute goalkeeping problem following complications with Preston Leech’s loan signing paperwork, Whitley brought in Adam Cameron just ahead of the deadline and as Barry said “Fair play to Adam, he’s come in and helped us out massively. I thought he was really good, especially with the ball at his feet, a top lad coming in and doing us a job and we might need him again on Tuesday.”
