Formartine United4–2Clachnacuddin

Although the score-line represents an accurate enough picture of the overall standards produced by the teams, the way in which it was assembled was bizarre in the extreme. At 88 minutes Formartine, well against the run of play were trailing Clach, who with every passing minute looked increasingly like they would be able to hold on to snatch a surprise victory. By the time the game concluded two or three minutes later Formartine had turned the deficit into a comfortable margin of victory and the fat lady never uttered a note.

With the exception of the introduction of Callum Bagshaw to the bench Formartine fielded an identical squad to the one that had comprehensively overwhelmed Keith in mid-week.The striking partnership of McKay and Madle at the head of a 3-5-2 formation had worked wonders then and initially looked like doing the same again as Formartine dominated proceedings from the outset as Madle and McKay supported by the speedy Napier broke through the centre and showed immediately that they not only meant business but had the equipment in the way of pace and muscle to severely stretch the visiting rearguard. With five minutes played, the pattern which was to remain for the rest of the match was established: Formartine were leading from the front foot and Clach orchestrated from deep by the wily old Morrison, were content to soak up pressure and hit on the break. The Formartine pressure was fierce and sustained and it looked like being only a matter of time before they would breakdown the resistance offered by their visitors.

The worry from Formartine’s perspective was that infrequent though they were, the Clach breaks were well organised and sharp enough to stretch the home back three of Hay, Smith and Munro. When a back three is stretched, the support it gets has to an extent a makeshift element as midfielders temporarily take on defensive duties at which some are better than others. In the 6th minute Clach had broken forward and in the second phase of play from a corner on the right, the ball was only half cleared by Napier. MORRISON had stationed himself a few yards short of the box in anticipation of such an eventuality and seizing his chance drilled the ball hard and low through the ruck of players in the box past the left hand of a probably unsighted Shearer into the corner of the net.

This initially seemed like a minor hiccup in the homeside’s progress and Formartine pressure resumed at a high level. It was clear that the Clach rearguard were finding Madle in particular a rather hot handful. His pace was more than they could contain by conventional means and they responded by taking it in turns to foul him. Formartine pressure continued unabated but it still took until the twenty fifth minute for them to open their account. After a period of sustained and intense pressure where they forced corners at either side Formartine had their big guys from further back – Hay and McKeown up in the Clach box looking for some aerial action. A ball from Anderson out wide left was floated in to the near post where centre back Hay beat Skinner and keeper MacDonald to the ball and forced it over the line from no more than a yard or two out. Not the prettiest goal of all time but it came just at the time when frustration deriving from the inability to convert pressure into goals was creeping in.

The goal galvanised Clach as much as it settled Formartine and little changed to the pattern of play. Clach were adept at getting bodies behind the ball and although Formartine dominated midfield as an area and had far more possession they had a densely packed final third populated by very industrious Clach players whose approach was to give nothing away at the back and hope for a bit of luck on the break on the back of the occasional long ball played into the far corners to stretch the home back three. Play continued in this way until the interval.

Formartine were bombarding the Clach goal: Madle, McKay, Napier, Anderson, McVitie all went pretty close but found those of their efforts that were not deflected off course were ever so slightly off target. Clach were riding their luck but were to be fair, utterly dogged in their defensive efforts. There is dogged and there is foul. A couple of minutes before the interval McKay broke through the centre and having legged it past McGurk and Doran was one on one with the advancing keeper. He flicked the ball past the custodian and on his way to collect it and slot it into the unguarded net was simply felled by the keeper who unable to reach the ball elected to prevent the forward reaching it either. For reasons known only to himself referee Cooper saw nothing wrong and allowed play to continue. The mystery in the decision was if McKay had not been fouled he must have simulated so. Either way a rather heinous crime had been committed by someone.

The second half began as the first had concluded with Formartine pressing forward and Clach launching the odd long lob down to the corners. Again Formartine were dominating proceedings but yet again Clach managed to pinch a goal against the run of play. After another spell of Formartine pressure, a long over the top ball it was knocked back via a Formartine defender to Shearer who was forced to kick clear. The kick was severely sliced and fell straight to Grant who bore in on goal with only McKeown in the immediate vicinity. The captain made the challenge and managed to extract the ball but it was definitely mounted from behind and thereby illegal. The referee awarded a yellow card and a penalty kick. Morrison hit it low and hard to Shearer’s right and although the big keeper got pretty close to it he could not prevent Clach taking the lead for the second time.

That saw the end of Clach as an attacking force as they set themselves up for a very spirited attempt to hold onto their slender lead for the remaining half hour. Their work rate and communication were of a very high order and Formartine again found themselves trying to make space in a crammed penalty box. Shots rained in but so densely was the area packed that they continually rebounded from a vast array of different parts of Clach personnels’ anatomies. In truth, for all the pressure, the keeper was little worked.
However persistence is its own reward and in the 88th minute after intense Formartine pressure around the goal mouth the ball spun loose a foot or two from the base of the keepers left upright and the quickest to react was the ubiquitous “Biscuits” McVITIE who got a boot to it to force the ball home to equalise.

At this point, the game had score draw writ large upon it, but the goal had the effect of raising Formartine belief and simultaneously drawing Clach out from their defensive shell. Had Clach been prepared to continue in lockdown mode to hold on for the draw, they almost certainly would have done so. Instead they threw caution to the winds and in their attempts at attack gave Formartine the space they needed. An over the top ball from Formartine reached sub Cammy KEITH in acres of space. He simply did what he did best and ran on in on the keeper before lashing the ball past him into the net to establish a very late lead.
Clach now had to continue to attack and Formartine again cashed in with an excellent solo goal from Duguid who simply streaked down the left wing cut in about fifteen yards short of the goal line and hit a perfectly angled cross cum shot low to the back post. It beat the keeper on its way into the extreme far corner of the net to complete a score line that was remarkable in its composition but perfectly valid as an account of the relative merits of the sides.