Appearances & Goals To Date

Andy Shearer (GK)		52 apps	-
Graham Hay		27 apps	5 goals
Stephen Jeffrey		37 apps	1 goal
Stuart Smith		55 apps	1 goal
Stuart Anderson		40 apps	7 goals
Callum Bagshaw		48 apps	7 goals
Neil McVitie		47 apps	10 goals
Gary Clark		34 apps	1 goal
Cammy Keith		55 apps	40 goals
Marek Madle		23 apps	14 goals
Paul Napier		43 apps	4 goals

Starting Lineup

Matchday Squad

First Team Debuts

Milestones

A crucial cup tie away to Buckie is anything but the ideal way to conclude a seven week period of weather enforced idleness, but Formartine, looking remarkably fresh and chipper shed any possible deposits of rust and took the game straight to Buckie from the outset. That was a bold strategy for two reasons: in their previous encounter back in November, Buckie had turned over Formartine quite comprehensively to send them tumbling out of the Aberdeenshire Shield. Not only that, but the Jags were playing their first game under new management, a factor that usually produces a lift in form for the side concerned. So much publicity had attended the elevation of “Spider” Stewart to the managerial hot seat that when hearing of the salary involved in recruiting the spider, a local was rumoured to have asked if “they couldnae hae got a cheaper een aff the web”.

Whatever the pre-match shenanigans, Formartine went about their business with admirable application. With only minutes gone it was clear that with Bagshaw running with the ball in midfield and Anderson threading balls through gaps and producing a range of chips and flicks past defenders to reach the front two of Madle and Keith, Buckie were struggling to cope with Formartine pace and pressure. Both strikers showed that they had the speed, muscle and skill to get the ball past Hegarty who was quickly reduced to illegal means of attempting to cope. On the other side, Wood was faring only marginally better. With such offensive force Formartine’s steady looking rearguard of Smith, Hay, Jeffrey and McVitie was able to occupy a high line and compress the game from a position little more than ten yards or so into their own half. For Buckie both Low and Fraser looked lively enough but it was also apparent that they were given little cuttance by Formartine defenders.

In these circumstances, with Formartine calling most of the shots an early(ish) goal was on the cards. Almost predictably it came as a result of Madle exploiting Hegarty’s lack of nous and pace to sprint past him taking the ball to the bye line and biding his time just long enough to roll it precisely into the stride of Cammy KEITH who leathered it home low past Burr in the 17th minute.
The Formartine pressure continued with Buckie, at this stage looking pretty well off the pace. Formartine rhythm and tempo were brisk and surprisingly, given the length of the break, quite slick at times. The second goal came as no surprise and was virtually a mirror image of the first. Where Madle had skinned Hegarty down the left, Keith did pretty much the same to Wood on the right before slipping the ball across to MADLE to finish from close range. At two goals to the good with only twenty five minutes played, it looked as though Formartine could or should have been able to press on and increase their margin by half time. They didn’t.

It wasn’t really a case of their taking their foot off the pedal as much as Buckie beginning to find a bit more shape and a bit of luck to boot. There was a brisk but intermittent flukey kind of wind and it blew to Buckie’s advantage in the 32nd minute. A clearance by Wood was humped high down the middle by Munro and blew over the Formartine central defenders. LOW was off like a flat out futtret and got the ball on side in space behind the defence. Keeper Shearer did well to close him down but the wily forward chipped the ball over the keeper who did get a finger tip to it but not quite enough on it to prevent it dribbling into the net at the base of his left hand upright.

This prompted something of a Buckie revival which may have caused or possibly resulted from some apparent midfield reorganisation with Munro taking a more central position. Whether cause or effect, the game moved into a more evenly balanced phase which continued until half time and beyond.
Buckie started the second half with a much more sprightly demeanour than they had in the first and Formartine’s near legendary capacity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory crept into the minds of more than one spectator. The first fifteen minutes of the second half were much nervier looking and significantly less fluent than the corresponding period of the previous half as Buckie battled hard to get back on terms. For all that they tried, Formartine maintained shape and discipline and weathered the storm. By the hour mark Formartine were again gaining the upper hand and although some defensive reorganisation by Buckie meant that Keith and Madle were having a leaner time than formerly, Formartine had territorial advantage and squeezed and squeezed. With the corner count at 14 to 3 in Formartine’s favour the level of pressure was going to produce something. In the 69th minute, a free kick near the left corner of the Buckie box was drilled in hard and low by Anderson. As the ball rattled about in the forest of legs on and near the goal line Marek MADLE reacted first and best to prod the ball home for number 3.

That should have left the visitors on easy street but Buckie had different ideas and almost immediately reduced the deficit back to a single goal. It came on the back of a softish looking penalty when Fraser trying to winkle his way into the right side of the box was impeded by Smith. HEGARTY slotted the spot kick home centre right as Shearer went left and the cup tie was set for a cliff-hanger ending. This never really materialised as try though they might Buckie could not match the level of ball retention that Formartine maintained and the visitors although only one goal to the good looked the more likely to score. And they did. With three minutes to go Formartine’s 16th corner of the game yielded fruit. The ball was swung over from the left by Anderson and was partially cleared. It was played back in and half cleared again until captain Hay capped an immaculate performance by collecting the ball in the hole to the right side of the box and clinically despatching it low and hard beyond the outstretched left hand of Burr.

This produced the scoreline that the Formartine performance merited. They were better man for man more or less throughout, they survived a rather flukey goal and a softish penalty and still came out winning by two goals. Not many teams will take four off Buckie. However they now face the resurgent Cove both Cup and League in coming games. That will show what they are made of.

Match report by Colin Keenan



Photography by Ian Rennie