Formartine United5–2Keith

This was a game dominated by a strong, strangely warm wind that swept down the pitch from top right to bottom left at the village end. Keith made good enough use of the advantages it offered when they had it almost at their backs in the first half and managed to dig out a fairly precarious 2-1 lead at the interval. When it was their turn to reap its advantage, Formartine ruthlessly exploited it to bombard the visitors with 4 goals in a twenty minute spell that all but blew them away.

On the back of their exciting cup victory over Annan at the weekend United, predictably, fielded the same starting eleven against a Keith side that has been on a bit of a run lately and earned itself the reputation of being able to hold its own against whatever any side in the league can throw its way. The game started at a helter-skelter pace with the end to end characteristics of a cup tie and the influence of the wind was immediately apparent: wind assisted goal kicks by Bell easily reached the United box whereas those by MacDonald landed well short of the halfway line. Such circumstances demanded patient, close passing on the deck stuff in one direction and piling forward under long balls in the other and that for the first half was by and large the order of the day. In the circumstances it was some testament to Formartine persistence that they managed to establish and retain some territorial advantage.

The front pair of Gethins and Barbour supported superbly by the direct running of Rodger and Masson and the silkier skills of Anderson did enough to force Hutcheson, Spink, Clark and Milne in to more rearguard action than they could comfortably contain. A couple of corners (one at each side) went through three or four phases of play before Keith could clear their lines. In the 12th minute a goal kick by Bell, flew down the park on a great gust of wind and looked like it had landed fine for Ewen at the centre front edge of the box, but the ball bounced beyond him and within a whisker of blowing over the top of MacDonald into the net before the keeper got just enough of a purchase on it to deflect the ball from what looked like an ominously net bound course.
In the 17th minute the combative Rodger having been squeezed to the deck by the attentions of Raffel and Fraser was still able to bump the ball forward to GETHINS who, pursued by Clark immediately bore in on goal. As the keeper advanced to narrow the angle the lethal striker drilled the ball with laser like precision through the quickly decreasing gap between keeper and the left upright.

The goal was consistent with the run of play but Formartine, because of the conditions remained vulnerable. They would carefully work the ball through a dozen or so passes to get into the vicinity of the Keith area whereas a single almighty hoof into the wind could return the ball to the corresponding position at the other end. Formartine came near to extending their lead in the 23rd minute when a cunningly curled shot from United’s Scott Barbour looked to have beaten Bell but the ball died in the wind just short of the goal line a touch in from the keepers left post and he was able to just touch it round for an unrewarded corner.
On the half hour, his name sake Luke BARBOUR equalised. The ball was chased down the left by Cormack who controlled it well before delivering it neatly to the striker who had nipped in behind the defence from the other side and banged it quickly past MacDonald from about 12 yards out.

The combination of the wind and Keith’s adrenaline was for a time as much, or maybe a wee shade more than United could contain and despite their persistence of working the ball up the park, Keith were managing to pin them back in their own back yard for a while and that was enough to get them a second 9 minutes later. It wasn’t dissimilar to the first although the personnel were different. Cashing in on wind assistance to loft the ball into spaces behind defenders Cormack got through to pick up an over the top ball and advancing through the inside right channel, released it to FRASER who drove it home from about twelve yards range. United were however far from out of it and came near to levelling things when a Roger drive whistled past Bells left upright. Their superior possession was enough to ensure that the interval deficit remained at a single goal.

The question was that with wind advantage reversed would a one goal lead be enough for Keith to get anything from the game? The answer was almost immediately apparent as United visited an assault of epic proportions on the visitors. It took them 7 minutes of incessant pummelling at a rather packed Keith defence before they levelled the game. The ball had been played across the goalmouth left to right from Masson and back again the other way by Rodger before being partially cleared to a position just outside the box where lurked the wily veteran YOUNG cannily awaiting just that eventuality. Standing on no ceremony, he picked a spot beyond the keeper’s reach to the right and skelped the ball directly and unstoppably there.

Formartine were an almost irresistible force by now and the whole momentum of the game lay with them. Less than 5 minutes later they had the lead. Some slick interplay between Gethins, Rodger and Barbour triangulated a route through a packed defence and set up BARBOUR who clipped the ball home from about ten yards. There was no way United were going to surrender that lead and sustaining the same tempo and territorial pressure an increase was almost inevitable. In the 65th minute a free kick after Barbour had been felled around five yards shy of the left corner of the box was taken by MASSON who delivered a fierce, lowish, dipping ball curling in at the back stick. Whether the ball reached its destination in the net by rebounding there from the back post or whether it required a little further assistance from Gethins as he seemed to claim (but good strikers claim anything and everything do they not?) is a moot point. Gethins argued the case that the mitre ball lettering was still imprinted on his forehead when he was later substituted.

The United blitzkrieg continued and in the 72nd minute the final 5-2 score line was established when BARBOUR carved out a clever finish from a move which looked like it had petered out near the goal line beyond the left post, but despite close attention he managed to pinch a yard or two, certainly no more, but it was just enough to create the angle needed for him to squeeze the ball past the keeper and in at the back stick.

This could have been a bit of a banana skin for United had they been at all tempted to rest on their laurels after their weekend cup exploits. They were too professional for that and produced a convincing victory against a team that is notoriously awkward to handle at present.