After a narrow derby victory at Tranent, Haddington Athletic paid their first visit of the season to Fife on Saturday to take on a Lochgelly Albert outfit who’d recorded a good 2-2 draw at Blackburn in their previous outing.

The three points gained at Tranent saw Haddington match their start to their ultimately unsuccessful 2012/13 campaign, with 25 points from a possible 27, but manager Johnny Harvey didn’t have his injury worries to seek – Chris Gordon, Michael Noble, Matty Lynch, Andrew Sinclair and Michael Fairnie were all spectators on the sidelines, while subs Chris Gray and Mark Smith weren’t fully fit.

There were two changes to the team which started at Tranent, with Derek Slight and Kenny McMillan starting in place of Gordon and Noble.

On a windy afternoon in Fife, with conditions soft underfoot, much of the play took place in the hosts’ half, and Arran Ponton shot just over the bar with the Hi Hi’s first opening on six minutes. Bob Berry had an opening after ten minutes but shot tamely past, and four minutes later he was well placed to keep out Berts’ striker Seath at the other end.

Lochgelly, though, went in front with 16 minutes played, a break finishing with Perrie sweeping home a shot from 12 yards. A suspiciously offside McMillan hit the side netting five minutes later as the Hi Hi pursued an equaliser, and Paul Tansey’s corners caused the home defence concern with close calls either side of the half hour. Overall, though, there was something lacking in Haddington’s play, and their afternoon took another disappointing turn on 36 minutes when Seath made it 2-0.

There was plenty of time for the visitors to turn things around – inside the space of a few minutes Slight brought a fine save from Wilson, McMillan headed just wide, and the home keeper saved from Berry and McMillan again. Lochgelly dealt their guests a severe blow in the second minute of first-half injury time, though, with Seath claiming his second goal of the afternoon – the unsighted Derek Polowyj got a hand to the ball but couldn’t prevent it crossing the line, and Haddington were left with a second-half mountain to climb.

They made a positive start to the second half as Ponton forced a shot from the edge of the box but the ball went well over the bar. Captain for the day Joe Murray came close as Haddington launched repeated attacks, but by and large there weren’t too many openings created in open play.

As time wore on it looked less and less likely the Hi Hi could avoid defeat, and the final nail in their coffin was hammered home with nine minutes left when Michael Motion slipped as he prepared to clear a long ball – Berts sub Hindley took advantage and, with Polowyj again having to commit himself, he slid the ball home to make it 4-0. A Ponton cross ended up in the net a couple of minutes later, credited as an own goal to otherwise impressive keeper Wilson, but it was small consolation.

Attention switches on Saturday to a Scottish Junior Cup second-round tie against one of the competition favourites Linlithgow Rose at Millfield.

Rightly regarded as giants of the junior game, Linlithgow are odds-on favourites to progress but Hi Hi boss Harvey will urge his players to make the most of the experience – the rash of injuries he has to contend with obviously doesn’t help their cause but it’s important there’s no sense of self-pity.