Appearances & Goals To Date

Errol Watson (GK)		9 apps	-
Craig McKeown		132 apps	20 goals
Michael Clark		19 apps	3 goals
Darryn Kelly		6 apps	1 goal
Stuart Smith		247 apps	24 goals
Andrew Greig		80 apps	25 goals
Graeme Rodger		204 apps	70 goals
Liam Strachan		17 apps	-
Aaron Norris		39 apps	3 goals
Scott Lisle		20 apps	12 goals
Gary McGowan		23 apps	8 goals
Kieran Lawrence (sub)		78 apps	2 goals
Garry Wood (sub)		161 apps	79 goals
Conor Gethins (sub)		125 apps	45 goals

Starting Lineup

Matchday Squad

First Team Debuts

Milestones

The last time these two met, it was on League business back in August and the score was exactly the same then as it was for this Aberdeenshire Shield tie. United made a lacklustre start to their defence of the one trophy they currently hold conceeding a rather soft early goal and struggling for the better part of an hour to breakdown a very well staffed home rearguard. After the equaliser was achieved they went on to comprehensively demolish their hosts with a barrage of goals. The puzzling thing about their initial inability to break down home resistance for as long as they did was the fact that all that time they held vastly more possession than Vale and as a consequence achieved significant territorial advantage.

United began the game firmly on the front foot and pressed Vale from the outset. Greig was an early thorn in their flesh and playing wide left delivered a number of balls into the box for McGowan and Norris. Early pressure was however more around the fringes of the box than within it. Vale were pretty well hemmed in until following the expiry of a prolonged period of possession by United when Robertson, about 25 yards out, picked up a loose ball, the product of a miscued clearance by Gauld and ran with it. He managed to progress largely untroubled by any serious attempt by United to disposess him until he reached the right corner and whippped the ball low across the 6 yard box straight to SCOTT who slid in to force the ball home at the back stick.

Vale were confident in their 5-4-1 set up and had little compunction in bringing their midfield 4 in to supplement the rearguard and at least initially United struggled to find ways to break through the throngs at the back. They huffed and puffed and tried a few shots from longer range the best of which were from Norris and Rodger albeit both were marginally too high.

This persisted until the hour mark when subs Wood and Lawrence came on for Clark and Strachan. The game changed almost immediately: Formartine levelled in the 64th minute when a Norris free kick wideish right about thirty yards out was played to the head of McKEOWN whose powerful header left Pennet with no chance. From that point on Formartine began to run Vale ragged. Three minutes after the equaliser, LISLE, fed initially by Kelly broke forward with a fast direct run through the inside right channel. Neither Noble nor Aitken could dislodge him from the ball nor otherwise thwart his progress until from about 12 yards out he blasted the ball past PENNET.

Vale had to chase the game then and in so doing left increasing space for United to get players into the box. A brief period of absolute seige conditions in the Vale rearguard saw shots from Rodger, McGowan and Wood all blocked or otherwise scrambled away until RODGER cannily stationed in the hole outside the box collected a rebound, measured his ordinance co-ordinates and hit a howitzer shot from twenty yards range straight to the back of the net for number three.

The fourth was a gem: in the 88th minute Gethins on as sub for Greig two or three yards shy of the box, a tad right of centre chipped a delicate wee lob over three defenders into the path of Gary WOOD who simply banged the ball past the left paw of PENNET to complete the rout.

Match report by Colin Keenan



Photography by Ian Rennie