This was a remarkably accomplished performance from a team at a relatively early stage in the process of major rebuilding. Against League 2 opposition Formartine were in competent and ultimately comfortable control throughout. After withstanding by means of consistent shape, sustained work -rate and good communication throughout, a brisk wind assisted opening salvo from ‘Shire they worked themselves into a position of first control and later dominance.

To have attained this standard of work -rate, determination and organisation in the time available and with the sheer number of new signings made augurs very well for serious championship ambitions. From a supporter’s perspective the evidence suggests that even better is yet to come.

East Stirlingshire started by using a wind which although not directly on their backs, was certainly in their favour to have an early go at the tourists. Attacks were launched predominantly down their left using the pace of Shepherd and Wright to work the ball into the box where the central defensive partnership of McKeown and Crawford gave nothing away. This wide pair found their attempts to get into a position from which to deliver a decent ball into the goal mouth regularly thwarted by Michie and sometimes by Rodgers. Only once during this opening period did Keeper Reid have to intervene to beat Shepherd to the ball that Wright had threaded through to him. A free from Wright rebounded off the near post before being cleared by McKeown.

For all that Shire showed that they could break at pace on that left side, Formartine demonstrated that not only could they handle that strategy but also that they could make breaks of their own and it became apparent after the first 10 minutes or so that theirs were better sustained and had greater variety to them: Anderson, Bagshaw and Rodger regularly provided a platform from where probing balls were delivered to and recycled from a vicious looking front pair of Gauld and Wood. This pairing of such disparate styles looks already to be highly effective. Home defenders had to deal with the combined threat of a ferret playing off a Rotweiller. They struggled to do so throughout. Initially it was the “futtret” that made them dance as twice in around five minutes he took Donaldson and Tully out to near the bye line at the right before gaining a yard or two of an angle and hammering very accurate drives that had keeper Dolan fully exercised to prevent them reaching the net via the back post. Such pressure was largely enough to snuff out the Shire’s ploys on the left by keeping wing back Shepherd confined to barracks on defensive duties.
The first product of Formartine’s more sustained attacks was a succession of corners. Initially these were successfully defended but there was always a sense that ES were struggling with these. Getting the ball away from the goal mouth was one thing but Formartine were set out in such a way that they could regularly recycle it back into another phase of attack. Shire were creaking and very quickly the corner count rose to 8-3 in Formartine’s favour. In the 18th minute United did what they were threatening to and delivered a goal of real verve and flair. Following a corner on the left the ball bobbled around in the goalmouth before being hacked away by Tully. The influential ANDERSON, lurking in the hole to the right of centre about two or three yards beyond the box, dropped a shoulder and leathered a viciously dipping drive that was beyond the reach of Dolan and nestling in the back of the net before the trialist keeper knew much about it.
This splendid opener set the template of a match where Formartine called most of the shots. They set a tempo that Shire struggled to match and were visibly the more consistently fluent side: able to both squeeze the opposition into their own territory for longish periods and break quick and clean from defence to attack when needed. Pressure continued and the corner count rose to 15 to 6 in Formartine favour and something further had to give. In the 36th minute they made more direct use of the corner as left back Stuart SMITH who as well as performing his defensive duties immaculately, put in a power of work with blistering overlap runs down the flank and elected to remain up at the opposition end after one of those had contributed to a corner. Rising with perfect timing a yard or two from the back stick he headed the ball fiercely home between the keeper’s outstretched left paw and the upright for number two.

East Stirlingshire tried gamely to get back into the game but, lacking much shape to their attacks found their single striker, Vittoria increasingly marginalised by his inability to get anything out of the impressively athletic Crawford and/or the obdurate McKeown. For all that, they managed to get some share of possession and midfield territory- not enough to trouble Formartine only enough to blunt their attacking force until almost the stroke of half time when Gauld, spear- heading a Formartine attack down the right broke into the box with only the keeper to beat. The pursuing Tully had no compunction in felling him from the rear. The fact that this was an obvious goal scoring opportunity yielded a “friendly” decision of a penalty but no red card. Gauld took the spot kick himself and was a touch unfortunate with the result. He drove the ball hard and central but a touch low for a central one. The keeper was slowish to make a dive to his right. The ball rebounded from his heels to safety but there was a decent chance that had he been quicker to get down, his feet wouldn’t have been there and the ball would have been in the net.

The second half saw the introduction of the elegant Lawson for Bagshaw. It started much as the first had with Shire trying to get some cuttance down the flanks. This time the spearhead was McKenna. The initial minute or two of surge from the home side were enough to create a degree of chaos in the Formartine area. A driven free by Wright rebounded from the near post although Reid looked to have it covered. The ball bobbed around in the box like a cork in a stormy sea before Shire gained a corner on the right. Shepherd swung the ball into the back post and after a bit of a rammy, the muscular McKENNA managed to force his way between Reid and his left upright and drag the ball over the line into the net in the 48th minute.

This perked up the homeside for a bit, but Formartine were still the side with the better shape and workrate although Shire breaks seemed to carry a wee bit more menace than before and a Wright, McKenna interchange yielded a crisp shot from the former that rebounded from the woodwork. The Formartine front two were real thorns in the flesh of the home defenders and Wood dragged defenders to places they clearly did not want to go. By the hour mark Formartine were again dictating shape and tempo and generally looking like they were the higher league team. A period of sustained pressure around the 63rd minute forced Shire onto the back foot. Barbour had the pace and guile to ask an increasing number of questions of Greeene and Tully and having, not for the first time, seen them off, set up the goal that put the game completely beyond Shire’s reach. He clipped the ball into the area in front of the keeper’s right stick. Wood muscled his way to it and applied the touch that was needed to complete the final yard or two of its journey into the net.

The game as contest was now done and dusted and shape and form began to give way to the need to experiment with different combinations of substitutes. Despite copious use of subs Formartine continued to dominate as the clock ran down.