Appearances & Goals To Date

Kevin Main (GK)		16 apps	-
Jevan Anderson		42 apps	1 goal
Joe MacPherson		3 apps	-
Johnny Crawford		104 apps	5 goals
Stuart Smith		203 apps	19 goals
Stuart Anderson		175 apps	32 goals
Graeme Rodger		147 apps	51 goals
Andrew Greig		27 apps	10 goals
Ryan Stott		8 apps	3 goals
Archie MacPhee		52 apps	38 goals
Gary Fraser		9 apps	2 goals
Conor Gethins (sub)		77 apps	33 goals

Starting Lineup

Matchday Squad

First Team Debuts

Milestones

Games between these two are normally close run affairs but seldom result in a draw and this one produced a superb contest between two attack minded teams who went at each other hammer and tongs without really tilting over whatever imaginary line there is between a physical encounter and a “dirty” match. It stayed the right side of dirty but was still a red blooded encounter conducted at an amazing lick from start to finish and there was heaps of good quality, skilled football to entertain a decent sized crowd. A great advert for Highland League football. Both teams were right in there in contention for leading the League and Forres arrived on the back of back to back games where their captain Stuart Soane (ironically a former Formartine player) scored successive hat tricks.

United started this game with two centre backs, Joe Macpherson and Jevan Anderson whose combined age of thirty four years is pretty well the same as that of injured centre half Craig Mckeown, on his own. With Gary Wood and Scott Henry also out injured, there was an inevitable lack of experience in the centre of Formartine's defence. The youngsters nevertheless acquitted themselves capably enough and it is interesting that both goals conceded came directly from set pieces.

The game started at breakneck pace with Forres first to show with an attack on the left side of the United penalty area that quickly yielded an unrewarded corner. This was cleared away as far as the middle of the United half but Forres were back pressing again seconds later trying to hit United before they could settle. However settle they did and by the third or fourth minute they were attempting to prise open the visitors' defencet. The first attempt was on the left as Greig, twisting and turning managed to pinch enough space from Groat to get in a menacing cross that wasn't too far from the head of MacPhee who was attacking the back post area. The next was a break from the inside right channel by MacPhee who despite very close attention from Fraser and Macpherson still got in a clever dipping, angled shot from about 15 yards that flew just the wrong side of the junction of upright and cross bar.

This was shaping up more like a cup tie than a league game. In the 5th minute McGoveren landed awkwardly after a midfield challenge and was stretchered off with what is suspected to be medial ligament damage. He was replaced by Taylor and the game resumed at the same furious pace.

Forres came close in the 14th minute when a ball threaded through by Soane left Taylor one on one with Main but the keeper was on him in a flash forcing him to snatch at the shot which went over the top. A break by Stott who was by some distance the fastest on the park took him down the right flank and behind the defence before whipping over a cross that was just intercepted by centre back Fraser on its way to Rodger who had made a run towards the back post.

There was little to choose between the sides but the pace and fervour of the game was such that it could never be a goalless affair. The deadlock was broken in the 20th minute with what looked like a well executed delivery of a training ground move. The Cans were awarded a free kick about 35 yards out and a bit right of centre. As players from both sides massed in the box expecting either a right to left shot or a chip into the area in front of goal, the ball was instead dinked a few yards left to right to MACRAE who nipped in behind the defence and banged the ball past Main.

United however were well up for this one and Forres had a fight on their hands as the home side roared back. They moved the ball from back to front with pace style and precision within a minute Greig chipped the ball across the goal face to MacPhee whose header beat the keeper all ends up but rebounded into his arms from the cross bar. United continued to ask more and more questions of the Forres rearguard. Attacks were generally down the flanks where Smith would support Greig on the left and Crawford did like-wise with Stott on the right. MacPhee led the line with Fraser lying deeper often, linking with or playing in Rodger from central midfield. It took ten minutes for this pressure to yield the equaliser. The pressure on the visitors' goalmouth had just passed a very acute phase and defenders were beginning to push on out when the ball was knocked back into the box to MACPHEE in splendid isolation, well behind the line of defense, simply blasted the ball home from ten yards out and a bit right of centre. Forres howled in protest but ref Northcroft could not be persuaded that it was off-side.

With the teams level again and Forres feeling aggrieved the intensity ramped up a tad more. The end to end pattern continued and tackles were delivered with increasing vigour. There was still nothing in terms of possession or territorially to separate the two. Rodger went close at one end and Soane at the other but both keepers were in good form and it looked like the deadlock could continue at least until the interval but 6 minutes before it came a wave of Can Cans attack yielded a corner on the right. It was delivered conventionally enough to the area beyond the back stick where muckle centre back Graham FRASER rose above the defence to head the ball powerfully home.

The second half was all about Formartine trying to pull the fat out of the fire. How they tried and, truth be told, they made enough chances to do so. Just as in the Wick defeat they failed to turn pressure and opportunity into goals. The fact that Knight in the Forres goal was in superb form didn't help. He made some crucial saves at key points in the game. During a period of United pressure just after the hour mark, he saved from Greig who had skinned Fraser to get in position to unload a ferocious 16 yard drive. Two minutes later he saved his side again making a great block from sub Gethin's header after he was set up by MacPhee. A route one attempt when keeper Main found Greig who immediately set off goalward to find his effort thwarted by Knight.

In the 80th minute he denied Greig again after he had got in on the end of a slick exchange of passes with sub Gethins only for the keeper to make a fine reflex block.

There were other chances that didn't need the keeper to deny U nited. In the 82rd minute Gethins, almost literally on the penalty spot, to take a cross from Greig failed to hit the target. A minute later, a decent MacPhee shot that did beat the keeper and was on target too was hoofed off the line by Groat.

As the clock ran down United's efforts to salvage a point or three reached fever pitch. In the 89th minute a Stewart Anderson cross found MacPhee but the forward's header slipped past the far post.

Interspersed with all this the visitors had their moments too and found that keeper Main was in mean mood too. He certainly kept the score down by denying Macrae (who had been set up by Soane) by blocking his thumping shot and then intercepting the same players cross to Soane at the back post.

For the neutral the high point of the game arrived with a 90th minute penalty – you could hardly script write that. Rodger had burst into the box only to be brought down by Groat. Penalty given. Gethins hit the post. That was it.

Match report by Colin Keenan



Photography by Ian Rennie

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