East Stirlingshire boss Pat Scullion left frustrated by side's 'lack of pride' in defending

Scott Honeyman celebrates with Luke Rankin (Pics by Alan Murray)

Despite going 3-1 up on the hour mark after goals from Luke Rankin, Jamie Penker and Scott Honeyman had Pat Scullion’s side well ahead after Max Wright’s opener, a twenty minute hat-trick from Ally McColm handed the away side the three points.

And boss Scullion admitted his team need to “have more pride” in stopping goals, with the Falkirk club sitting in 16th place out of 18 in the table, having collected only 13 points from their opening 15 matches.

“You cannot concede four goals in a game and expect to get something from it,” a frustrated Scullion told Shire TV. “Offensively we were good. We had so many efforts and we scored three great team goals. We showed individual brilliance in moments too.

Falkirk loanee Scott Honeyman looks to curl home (Pics by Alan Murray)

“We look like we are in full control of the match with twenty minutes to go but we defend naively. We don’t deal with first and second balls well enough. When you score their second goal, it gives them a lift.

“We’ve lost too many goals recently and we have came out on the wrong side of a one-goal swing too often now. We need to work on the basics of defending. A game lasts 90 minutes. It is only us that can change.

“I though we were the better footballing side, but that doesn’t matter if you don’t put points on the board and we haven’t done that in the previous two matches now. You need to have a strong base, we need to have more pride in stopping the ball going into our own net.”

Meanwhile, Bo’ness United were defeated 3-1 at Forthbank on Sunday afternoon by the University of Stirling.

Broomhill's Max Wright, who scored, holds of Shire's Sam Young

Stuart Hunter’s team were 1-0 up at the break after a coverted Ryan Porteous penalty, but they lost three second half goals to drop down to fifth place.

In the East of Scotland second division, Bo’ness Athletic lost their 100 per cent league record status as they were edged 2-1 by Stirling University on Friday night.

Willie Irvine’s men are still six points clear at the top of the table.

In the first division, Dunipace were 4-0 winners over Blackburn United at Westfield, with that victory keeping them in third spot.