That left Draggnett Thistle Vintage with six minutes in which to score an equaliser (referee Chris Niven added two minutes of stoppage time).
In the 55th minute, 1st Class Decorators Wainui Salty Dogs had gone down to 10 men when leftback Barry McCarthy was sent off for “striking an opponent”.
McCarthy had made a run forward and was “caught” in the tail-end of a tackle by Thistle rightback Stefan Faber. McCarthy took exception to the challenge, chased Faber and pushed him heavily.
A bit of push and shove ensued, and Roger Faber (Stefan’s father) was yellow-carded for his part in the incident.
Initially, Wainui managed the fallout from the sending-off effectively.
Midfield was the main battleground, and it was a good contest.
Connor Findlay was outstanding for Wainui in the middle of the park, chasing, tackling and setting up play.
Alongside him, Jimmy Lawrence never let up in his efforts to destroy threats and create chances, while Marcel Campbell operated to good effect in the space just behind the front-runners.
For Thistle, three men made a crowd in central midfield. Jason Scott was tireless in his harrying role, player-coach Dave Raggett was at his abrasive best and Dave Watson played with deceptive efficiency, gliding between attack and midfield.
In the 70th minute, Wainui striker Ricky Boyd chased a ball out to the right and sent in a lofted cross-cum-shot that dropped awkwardly on the goal-line.
Thistle goalkeeper Charlie Kapene couldn’t get to it but a defender, running back, got his head to it, but only enough of a connection to power the ball into the roof of the net . . . 1-0 to Salty Dogs.
Vintage fought back. Scott hit the inside of the right-hand post from 25 metres in the 73rd minute, and striker Neil Hansen’s 78th-minute effort brought a full-length save from Wainui keeper Angus Kelly.
But Wainui were coping well. Kelly Spring had come on to fill the gap at leftback and had a stormer, Andre Campbell and Schallinger were combining well in the middle of the defence, and Jeff Allen was indefatigable at rightback.
In the 82nd minute, Allen was penalised for a tackle from behind — a type of challenge common until the end of the 1980s, but not now.
He said something to the effect that the opponents’ claim of a foul did not mean a foul had been committed.
But a football field is not a democracy, and “dissent by word or action” these days can mean a yellow card and 10 minutes in the sinbin, which took Allen out of play for the rest of normal time.
That left Wainui with nine men to defend their lead.
In the 86th minute, Wainui striker Boyd was replaced by Roberto Sthory, who went to rightback.
As this was happening, Wainui were preparing to take a defensive free-kick close to their penalty area.
The two players nearest the ball were told to take the kick. When the referee felt the delay fell within the realm of time-wasting, the players — Lawrence and Schallinger — were shown yellow cards. As Schallinger had been cautioned in the first half, his second yellow card automatically led to the red being shown, and Wainui were down to eight men.
Now it was everyone back for Salty Dogs.
Burgess — who had shared attack duties with Phill Gill, Hansen and, wide on the right, Jared Faber — found space left of centre, 20 metres out, and shot low to the far post.
As the ball hit the inside of the netting, Wainui players and supporters appealed for offside, but the linesman’s flag stayed down.
Wainui had time to kick off and no more.
Allen was back on for extra time and things weren’t so desperate for Salty Dogs. But they were still two men down, and their best hope was to hold on for a penalty shoot-out.
When Thistle went 2-1 up in the first half of extra time, the end was nigh. Raggett got to the byline on the left and cut the ball back for Burgess to finish with a first-time left-foot strike into the far corner from eight metres out.
Three minutes before the extra-time break, Watson looked as if he might have increased the lead with a hard shot from 10 metres that keeper Kelly appeared to drag back into play. But with the linesman level with the last outfield defender, the defending team got the benefit of the doubt.
Wainui attacked with what resources they could muster, and Marcel Campbell drew a yellow-carded tackle from Thistle centreback Geoff Griffin.
Apart from the yellow and red cards, Wainui also suffered with the loss through injury of striker Benjamin Gonzalez. Throughout the first half and into the second, he looked dangerous.
He sprained an ankle in a tackle and, after trying to “run it off”, he had to be replaced.
Wainui left-flank midfielder Jonathan Andrew put in a good shift and Zach Destounis got stuck in on the right.
Damian Archdale and Boyd had limited opportunities up front because they were outnumbered, but did what they could.
Thistle had done well to hold Wainui scoreless in the first half. Salty Dogs were going for the local Division 2 league-and-cup double, and they looked the more likely to produce a strong finish.
But they had trouble breaking down Thistle’s experienced defence of centrebacks Roger Faber and Griffin, and fullbacks Jared Owen and Stefan Faber.
Player-coach Faber senior took himself off soon after the red-card incident with McCarthy, but Thistle had good defensive stocks to call on. Reece Brew and Toby Pickering are both sound defenders with good football heads and did not let the side down.
Referee Niven got a bit of stick from Wainui fans in the crowd.
He doesn’t need me to defend him because, so far as I could see, every big decision he made was correct under the laws of football.
Having said that, I should add that McCarthy’s actions were — I’ve been told — out of character, that Allen’s carefully worded dissent might have gone unpunished in a second division Eastern League game, and that Schallinger’s red-card circumstances carried a degree of bad luck.
None of that is the referee’s fault. So I wouldn’t put the result down to him.
Rather, I’d prefer to wonder at the peculiar set of circumstances that combined to produce a result that few outside the Thistle club would have predicted.
And I’d wonder whether it was in the stars that Roger Faber, 61 next month, would be in the same winning Chris Moore Cup team as his sons Stefan and Jared this year, and whether all the players in an extraordinary game of football — cue the Twilight Zone theme — were simply instruments of fate.
Salty Dogs will be back with bells on next year. Maybe they’ll go for the double again. If they achieve it, their success will be all the sweeter for this year’s disappointment.
