Appearances & Goals To Date

Andy Shearer (GK)		65 apps	-
Stephen Jeffrey		49 apps	1 goal
Calum Dingwall		41 apps	4 goals
Craig Duguid		30 apps	1 goal
Graham Hay		39 apps	8 goals
Stuart Smith		68 apps	2 goals
Stuart Anderson		53 apps	9 goals
Callum Bagshaw		56 apps	8 goals
Neil McVitie		56 apps	12 goals
Cammy Keith		68 apps	49 goals
Paul Napier		55 apps	4 goals
Liam Paterson (sub)		4 apps	-
Kieran Lawrence (sub)		3 apps	-
Marek Madle (sub)		34 apps	16 goals

Starting Lineup

Matchday Squad

First Team Debuts

Milestones

For the second time in three games Formartine have surrendered a one goal lead and gone on to be defeated by a team reduced to ten men. After losing out in this manner to the Locos, this was, as one wag put it, “deja vu all over again” as Formartine, this time enjoying (if that’s the right word in such circumstances) numerical advantage for an hour couldn’t resist the pressures inflicted by the boys from up the road for long enough to salvage even a point.

Turriff finish the season as highly creditable runners up to the undefeated Brora on 80 points (enough to win it some years) while Formartine lag 16 points behind them in 5th or 6th place - an indication of the scale of rebuilding required to get back in contention at the top of the pile. Being a bit of a derby, this game had little of the stale passivity that some end of season games can produce and both sides contested it at full throttle. It was rarely pretty, although some moves were slick enough, but more of a hardfought battle where Turriff were a bit more coherent and consistent as well as a tad sharper in front of goal where Formartine who created as many chances as their opponents did were denied by doughty defending and at least twice by the woodwork.

Turriff started in flat out mode and mounted an immediate attack down the left flank where the pacy MacAskill hustled Hay into an under struck pass which in turn put keeper Shearer under a bit of pressure before the ball was cleared. The game was end to end for the opening minutes although Turriff had slightly more possession than Formartine. Keith and Dingwall combined before the former fired in a crisp drive that keeper Main was well placed to take comfortably. Just as Turriff looked to be getting into a position to call the shots, Formartine, a tad against the run of play, produced an excellent 11th minute opening goal. Dingwall breaking down the inside left channel got the better of Davidson and drove the ball hard towards the back post but it was intercepted by some part of Bowden’s body and rebounded to ANDERSON out near the right corner of the box. The classy midfielder saw his chance and from a good twenty yards skelped the ball venomously past Main into the far corner of the net.

The immediate effect of this was to ramp up the pace of an already high tempo game. It wasn’t particularly dirty but no quarter was asked or given in midfield where the home middle three of McVitie, Bagshaw and Anderson were at least the match of their visiting counterparts. The game’s main talking point came in the 30th minute when McGowan who had the legs on Jeffrey seemed to be getting away from him in the space between the right corner of the box and the by line. A reckless, late rearward tackle brought the Turra man crashing to the ground before he took to his feet and squared up to the full back. The defender responded to this endearing response with what looked like a Glasgow kiss as sweet as any seen on a Saturday night in Sauchiehall Street. With players piling in to join the fray, the officials struggled to restore order. Protracted discussions ensued as ref Beaton and assistants began the nearest thing to the Levinson Enquiry Pitmedden has ever seen. Witnesses were interviewed and statements made but it took a long time for any conclusion to be reached. It looked like both Jeffrey and McGowan were initially yellow carded and that (surprisingly in the circumstances) Jeffrey was allowed to remain on the pitch despite what looked to most like violent conduct at the upper end of the scale. Following further discussions from assistants (one of whom was more than half a pitch away at the time) McGowan’s yellow was replaced with a red.

Play resumed with a free kick taken by MacAskill. He delivered the ball impeccably to the head of KUZNECOVS who headed it firmly and accurately past Shearer to provide instant retribution for ten man Turra. As with Locos (and to an extent Fort William) the reduction in numbers energised Turriff more than it did Formartine who again were unable to make the extra man work to their advantage. It was not a case of their taking their foot off the throttle it was simply a case that ten of Turra’s were still slightly more than a match for eleven of Formartine’s. Before the red card incident, Turriff were shading the possession and territorial stats; after it, things were more even but Formartine didn’t seem to carry enough fire power up front. Cammy Keith ran around a lot but generally looked to be a day late or a dollar short against a well drilled visiting defence. In the 40th minute he did get in a neat angled drive from a pretty tight angle on the right but Main had covered the angles and saved quite easily.

At the other end McKenna set up MacAskill for a drive that Shearer took comfortably and with Turra working hard to offset their numerical deficit Formartine looked short on ideas about how to cash in and half time was reached with little further incident.

The second spell began with Formartine playing well enough in the middle and with Napier and Dingwall operating out wide they should have had the resources to stretch ten man Turra more than they did. For the balls they did win in midfield not that many found their way out to the wings and when they did , the wide men struggled to do much with the ball thereafter as Turriff worked very hard to close them down. To succeed with ten against eleven you need to play a bit on the break in a counter- punching kind of way. Turriff showed this in the 73 minute when after soaking up a period of Formartine pressure around but not within their penalty area they broke forward centre left with Allan and McKenna spearheading the attack. The latter did enough to draw defenders towards him to allow space to his right for MacASKILL to receive the ball on the 18 yard line and with clear sight of goal he leathered the ball past the right hand of the diving Shearer to put his side in front. Turriff maintained an even more counter attacking approach and absorbed Formartine pressure. Both Keith and Bagshaw hit the woodwork from fairly close range as Formartine pressed to get something out of the game. After Keith hit the base of the post, the ball fell for McVitie near the penalty spot but adrenaline got the better of the midfielder and he somehow contrived to hoik the ball over the top.

Substitutes didn’t break the deadlock and the game with Turriff looking as comfortable as team in reduced circumstances can. held on competently to bag the points. This completed a disappointing season for Formartine. As Fraserburgh, who are just behind them in 6th position, have yet to complete Formartine will finish either 5th or 6th which is not part of their master plan at all. Substantial transfer activity is foreseen.

Match report by Colin Keenan

None.