Haddington’s first ever competitive meeting with a Spartans team came three weeks after their last outing, a disappointing home defeat by West Calder United, and boss Dave Griffiths was hopeful the rest might have done his team some good.  Alarmingly they had gone eleven games without a win since beating Dunbar United in a League Cup tie in late August, and with a miserable five goals in all that time it wasn’t hard to see where their main problem lay.

Spartans were less of a threat after the break and as the game wore on Haddington had the better of things, with Stobie rarely troubled in the home goal.  Subs Ross Rollo and Tomasz Ambrozy came on for the last half hour and both added spark to the Hi Hi’s attack.  Ambrozy looked set to score on seventy two minutes but dragged his shot wide, however compatriot Rusin kept it in play and teed up Rollo, who was upended in the box.  From the resultant penalty Patarek redeemed himself for his earlier error with a fine double save from Motion, who was first to the rebound.  Millfield regulars feared their team would pay the price for their failure to capitalise, but with seven minutes left they made sure of three points.  Rollo’s pace down the right posed problems for the Spartans defence and Patarek decided unwisely to help out, rushing to the edge of his area and allowing Rollo to play the ball into the path of Motion, who claimed his second goal by steering the ball into the empty net.  Comeback man Ross Ferguson came on for the last two minutes and almost added an unlikely third when his overhead kick from Rollo’s cross just cleared the bar.