Edinburgh City secured a place in the League One Play-Off final thanks to a late goal from on-loan Hibs’ striker Josh Campbell after a night of high drama at Ainslie Park
Manager Gary Naysmith retained the same starting XI that won in Elgin at the weekend.
The visitors made two changes with Rory MacEwan and Connor O’Keefe replacing Angus Mailer and Aiden Sopel.
The Citizens went into the game with a one goal advantage from the first leg but within 22-minutes the visitors were level on aggregate when Darryl McHardy headed home a corner.
Moments later the hosts equalised on the night and took a one goal lead in the tie when Craig Thomson’s excellent cross was slotted home by Danny Handling.
Four minutes before the break, Elgin regained the lead with another header from McHardy.
City pressed forward in the second-half and Callum Crane, Ouzy See, Handling and Campbell all had efforts on goal without success.
Naysmith replaced Andy Black with Jamie Dishington in an effort to find that elusive goal then moments later Crane made way for Conrad Balatoni.
Callum Antell produced a great save late on to keep the aggregate score level then with two minutes remaining, Campbell fired in a tremendous strike to secure a place in the play-off final.
City will now face Jim Duffy’s Dumbarton who beat Stranraer 1-0 in the other semi-final.
Edinburgh City: Antell, Thomson, McIntyre, Black, Brown, Handling, Jardine, Crane, Hamilton, Campbell, See Subs: Balatoni, B Henderson, Dishington, Goodfellow, Denham, De Vita, Harris
Elgin City: McHale, Cooper, Spark, McHardy, Bronsky, MacEwan, R Dingwall, Cameron, Hester, O’Keefe, MacPhee. Subs: Brown, Wilson, Sopel, Mailer, Peters, Osadolor, Kelly
Referee Craig Napier
John graduated from Telford College in 2010 with an HNC in Practical Journalism and since then he worked for the North Edinburgh News, The Southern Reporter, the Irish News Review and The Edinburgh Reporter. In addition he has been published in the Edinburgh Evening News and the Hibernian FC Programme.
