John Culatto
Gibraltar battled hard against a well-drilled and disciplined Estonia side as the wind made a fair match difficult.
As Gibraltar looked to continue the ‘growth process’ talked about by their manager Julio Ribas they almost went ahead too after TJ de Barr raced clear. Mihkel Aksalu brought him down and got off with just a yellow card.
The resulting free-kick got as close as the home side were able to get all game, hitting the cross-bar and going out. It was followed by another good chance, a one-on-one a few minutes later which Aksalu saved well.
After that the Nordic team had a prolonged period of possession that resulted in two clear-cut chances. Both were hit against the bar, the first from a goalmouth scramble and the second from long-range.
Kyle Goldwin was up to his usual heroics too, keeping out the Estonians with all his usual passion and flare. At the other end Gibraltar were limited to occassional counter-attacks, although the final pass was missing most of the time
Disallowed
The restart saw Konstantin Vassiljev score the first goal of the match no doubt helped by the wind. The shot from the free-kick curled past Goldwin just at a time when Gibraltar were finding their feet in the centre of the park.
Gibraltar did their best to get an equaliser but were unable to score, a goal disallowed for offside the closest being the closest they got to that accolade.
In the end it proved to be a good friendly for the boys and an opportunity for some of the peripheral players to get some minutes.
“The players had to really pick themselves up after the last match,” said Gibraltar manager Julio Ribas. “But we managed to give an opportunity to many of our youngsters and as you can see the senior players are still going strong.”
