Formartine United1–0Inverurie Locos

For the North Lodge faithful, the only thing better than beating Locos is to do so with a bit of style. In this Highland League Cup encounter, they managed the former without achieving the latter, scraping home after a rather dour, albeit never dirty, battle by Graeme Rodger's crucial late winner and defending that slender margin for the final ten minutes or so.

Conditions were excellent and United opened brightly with a speedy break down the right by Norris who crossed to back post to Lisle whose header had Reid fully occupied to push the ball round the post for a corner. A couple of minutes later United pressed again. Crawford made a run down the right before slipping the ball to Rodger whose shot from the penalty spot was hurriedly blocked by Watson. The response to that was a well wide shot by Stott off a Smith feed.

The game settled fairly quickly to the pattern that persisted more or less for the rest of the tie. Locos with a 4-4-2 formation had marginally the better of possession but United set up a tad more agressively with a 4-3-3, made rather more and more dangerous attacks when they were not bogged down in midfield endeavours.

In the 14th minute Rodger powered his way forward from that midfield, exchanged passes with Norris before offloading a crisp drive that was only narrowly wide of target. Locos responded five minutes later through Dingwall whose 25 yard effort at the other end met a similar fate. For the most part though it was a midfield battle relieved by occasional flurries of excitement when the odd counter attack came together such as when a Dingwall pass reached Smith in the 6 yard box and although Main had things covered the Englishman elected to bundle him into the goal. The keeper needed some treatment before resuming.

The tempo lifted a bit as half time approached and an Anderson corner reached Wood whose shot flew over the top. This was a couple of minutes before Locos' MacLean fed Smith down the right channel but the first time shot was anticipated and saved by Main. For United, Lawrence forced his way down the left twice in as many minutes. In the first instance he played in Norris whose cross was scrambled away by Broadhurst. Next he fed Lisle who slipped the ball inside to Wood whose strong low drive could only be palmed away by Reid.

The second half brought more of the same - more huff than puff really - with Locos generally shading possession but United making rather better chances on the counter. In the 47th Anderson brought in Lisle on the right to launch a cross cum shot which slid just wide of the far post. United ramped up the pressure with their first period of sustained attacking pressure round the 55th minute. Just after MacLean had fired a Gauld feed harmlessly wide and Kelly had calmly cleared a Stott run and shot, Formartine began a mini seige on the visitors' goal. Norris smacked a shot from the left edge of the box and a struggling Broadhurst trying to head clear managed only to head the ball onto the roof of his net with keeper Reid well beaten. A minute later a raiding run by Mackintosh finished with Reid pulling down a Rodger header from just under his bar before being pushed to tip a Wood header from a deflection of a Lisle cross over the top. As this pressure continued a Smith header was blocked just shy of its destination and a Wood overhead kick forced Reid into two attempts to scramble the ball to safety. Locos survived the onslaught and the game resumed its more midfield pattern until he 77th minute when Wood, Rodger and Anderson combined for Norris to head the ball goalward only for Watson to clear. A minute later the deadlock was broken: Smith advancing from left back played in Wood who timed his release of the ball to RODGER to perfection. The midfielder shaped his shot to beat Reid all ends up and all but seal the tie.

United shut up shop, pulling Wood back to reinforce the rearguard: Locos lacked the creativity to counter this and Formartine simply ran down the clock to seal the victory.