East of Scotland: Broxburn Athletic show they won't give up | Musselburgh pile misery on Newtongrange Star

Broxburn Athletic maintained their East of Scotland Premier Division title challenge as John Grant struck late on to beat Sauchie 1-0 at The Tony Macaroni Arena.

With league leaders Bo’ness United dropping points at home in a goalless draw against Dunbar United, the gap now stands at nine points although Broxburn have two games in hand.

With Albyn Park’s artificial surface being relaid, Broxburn have had to switch matches to nearby Livingston, but hope to return home for training this week with the groundwork completed.

“It was really tough game,” said Broxburn boss Brian McNaughton. “Sauchie beat us 3-0 at the start of the season and they’ve improved no end since then, they have a really good shape about them and they are a big team. They were the better team in the first half and we edged it in the second half.

“All it is about at the moment is grinding out the wins, especially with the weather. We will hopefully get back to our park this week for training on Thursday. Playing at Livingston has been good, but I think the away team gets a boost from it as well. We needed to do it short term to allow our park to get done, and it has been well worth it, we have won two games there.

“We just have to stay on Bo’ness’ coat tail and hopefully they will lose points because ultimately they are in a really strong position and they have played us and Hill of Beath twice. It’s not in our hands, we just hope we keep on winning and they drop points.”

Elsewhere. Newtongrange Star’s relegation woes depended as they lost out 4-1 at home to Musselburgh Athletic with Darren Downie bagging a hat-trick.