A below-strength Abbey Vale finished 2021 on a downer as they were thumped by Stranraer’s reserves on Saturday.
Rory McIntyre opened the scoring for the home side with a fantastic lob early on with Harry Mitchell doubling the advantage early in the second half.
Blair Dougan made it three 20 minutes from time with Martin McLorey finishing things off with a tremendous long range shot.
Vale coach Michael Love said: “We were missing a few players with illness. We managed to get down with a squad of 15 including a couple of young boys and some other boys who came along although they should probably have stayed at home as they weren’t feeling well.
“We had a few boys out of position but managed to get a team together to fulfil the fixture.
“They had a big squad of young boys but we gave a good account of ourselves in the first half. We hit the post in the first 30 seconds and had a goal ruled out for offside, which the referee said he got wrong. We could have gone in at half-time at 1-1 but unfortunately things didn’t go our way.”
The South of Scotland League is now taking a break over the festive period, with Vale’s next game planned to be at Newton Stewart on January 8.
They currently lie fifth in the table but are just three points behind third placed Creetown, who have played four games more.
“We’ll break for this week and build it back up for the restart.”
