Dundee 0 Clyde 1, Dens Park, 12/November/07

The Dark Blues made four changes—two enforced—to the side that started against St Johnstone eight days ago. With key midfielder McDonald and in-form striker Davidson falling ill, in came Paul McHale and Jani Sturm.Freddie Daquin dropped to the bench, with Gavin Swankie promoted, while David Worrell took the place of Martyn Corrigan who has gone back to Motherwell following his loan spell. Dundee squandered a decent chance on six minutes when Swankie fired past from inside the box, but other than that the early exchanges were bereft of excitement. Clyde’s first foray forward came on 26 minutes when the impressive Dougie Imrie’s cutback from inside the box had no takers.Scott Robertson shot wide for Dundee a minute later, then the Dark Blues came within inches of the opener when Bully Wee defender Steven Masterton sent a looping header on to his own bar with half-an-hour on the clock. The visitors thought they had taken the lead three minutes before the break when an Imrie corner from the right went past Robertson at the near post and appeared to cross the goal-line before being cleared by Worrell—neither referee Kenny Clark nor assistant David Watt thought so, however, and Dundee breathed a sigh of relief. After the interval, McHale had a shot deflected for a corner then— following a handball by Neil McGregor—Eddie Malone hit a freekick that was comfortably held by Clyde goalie David Hutton. The visitors produced the best move on 55 minutes when a crossfield pass from sub Christian Smith was superbly controlled by Imrie, who cut inside then shot just wide from the edge of the area.Lyle headed past three minutes later following good work from Swankie, who was beginning to make progress down the left, before Dundee’s Gary McKenzie had a header cleared.The Dark Blues were cranking things up now, and when the ball fell to Malone inside the box only desperate defending from Clyde kept their goal intact.Malone then went down inside the box under the challenge of Craig McEwan, but referee Clark pulled play back for a handball against the midfielder, with McHale getting booked for protesting the decision.Sturm beat the offside trap on 67 minutes but could not control the ball inside the six-yard box, then McHale worked his way into the area, but could only fire into the arms of Hutton. Dundee brought on Daquin on 72 minutes to an encouraging round of applause as he swapped places with Sturm. Clyde midfielder Raurie McLennan tested Craig Samson with an effort from 25 yards, which the Dens keeper punched away, before David O’Brien came on for Robertson. The roof then caved in on the home side with just four minutes to go. Man-of-the-match Imrie tormented Dundee out on the left again before delivering a cross into the box, which was deflected past Samson by full-back Dixon. Clyde sub Kevin Bradley was running in at the back post and would probably have scored anyway, but that was no consolation to Dixon. It could have been worse just after the restart when Samson, under pressure from Bradley, made a hash of things—and when the ball fell to Gary Arbuckle he could only blast over with the goal gaping. Dundee’s Milan Palenik had a snap-shot saved in injury-time, but it was Clyde’s day as they climbed off the bottom of the table. A poor result for Dundee, but at least we play Hamilton at Home next.......make or break game for us..........