Mears Group top the pile in Glasgow Goal fest
The first Glasgow Business Fives event of 2019 served up a whopping 227 goals scored in 39 matches between the companies that took part.
Almost £1,000 was raised for various charities by the players taking part in the event with the top fundraisers being the Business Moves Group who raised £330 and counting for their charity partner Beatson Cancer Charity as they made their way to the final. Other notable contributions were from iomart who continued to fundraise for JDRF taking their ongoing total well over £1,000 for the charity, while SST Sensing raised £200 for MacMillan and Martin Aitken & Co who raised £200 for SAMH.
The Winter season has now raised over £11,800 thanks to the efforts of the Glasgow Business Fives teams taking it over the 5 figure mark for the fourth consecutive season running.
Ambassadors Si Ferry and Gordon Smith entertained the players after the tournament sharing stories from their careers in the beautiful game.
On the pitch the action there was goals aplenty with the highest scoring match being KPMG’s 8-4 victory over SST Sensing who’s Emma Ryan was named as the player of the tournament. With 5 spaces at the National final up for grabs competition was high with the largest margin of victory recorded by ENGIE in a 7-1 win while BTO and ISG played out a 5 each draw.
From the opening stages teams progressed into the Champions League and Europa League section quarter finals. PwC, ISG, Ashurst, Mears Group, BMG, Martin Aitken & Co, ENGIE and iomart all found themselves in the Champions League section quarter finals
Reaching the Glasgow Business Fives champions league semi-finals offered a route to the National final for four of the 5 qualifiers and they were contested between PwC and BMG, with the latter winning through on penalties, and Mears Group and ENGIE with the former winning 4-2 to set up a final.
Anton MacLean couldn’t find a way past the Mears Group keeper, Davie Morgan who’s stunning shot stopping display earned him the Man of the Match in the final trophy after being singled out by the on watching Gordon Smith. Despite not finding the net in that particular match Anton had done enough to lift the tournament top goal scorer award. Mears held out for a 2-1 win in the final to be named the Glasgow Business Fives Winter 2019 champions.
In the Europa League section the semi-finals were played out between KPMG and BTO, with the accountancy firm squeezing past courtesy of a penalty shootout and the adjacent tie saw AutoRek win 3-0 against iomart who had got their via the back door. This set up a thrilling encounter in the final that could have went either way but KPMG held their nerve to run out 5-2 winners in the end thanks to some composed finishing which you can relive in the link to our Facebook page.
The events set off south to the north east of England with 3 qualifiers which will take place in Sunderland, Newcastle and Tees Valley in the region ahead of the national final in Edinburgh 22nd of March where teams will play for their chance to win a slice of the business fives charity donation for their chosen charity causes.
