Appearances & Goals To Date

Kevin Main (GK)		65 apps	-
Craig McKeown		133 apps	20 goals
Darryn Kelly		7 apps	1 goal
Stuart Smith		248 apps	24 goals
Stuart Anderson		222 apps	34 goals
Graeme Rodger		205 apps	70 goals
Gary McGowan		24 apps	8 goals
Aaron Norris		40 apps	3 goals
Kieran Lawrence		79 apps	2 goals
Scott Lisle		21 apps	13 goals
Garry Wood		162 apps	79 goals
Andrew Greig (sub)		81 apps	25 goals
Conor Gethins (sub)		126 apps	45 goals
Jordan Leydon (sub)		15 apps	2 goals

Starting Lineup

Matchday Squad

First Team Debuts

Milestones

There's something just not quite right with this Formartine side and this performance, a rather abject defeat (despite the scoreline) by local rivals, Locos comes on the back of a series of less than convincing performances. Forfeiting local bragging rights to Locos is hard enough for the United faithful to take, but this defeat leaves United's title aspirations for season 2019-20 damaged beyond any reasonable expectation of repair.

The best that can be said of their performance in this game is that they finished on the front foot and looked briefly as if they might do enough to salvage a draw. However their performance as a whole viewed over 90 minutes was well short of the standard needed at this level. Locos defended better, were superior in midfield and sharper up front leaving United a rather distant second in each of these departments. More importantly the visitors gave the impression of having a greater desire to win.

Formartine started briskly and certainly bossed proceedings for the first ten minutes or thereby and there was some power and pace in runs made, mostly through the channels by Norris and Lisle. In the fourth minute they had Locos well hemmed into their penalty area at the Meldrum end and having to soak up a barrage of shots from Rodger, Lisle and Wood and briefly it looked as if United could force an early lead. It was not to be. Locos were more than capable of soaking up that sort of pressure and were soon applying some of their own.

They began to squeeze things down at the village end and a hasty, understruck pass back by McKeown to Main was intercepted by Stott but the keeper was close enough to block the shot. Watt managed a strong 15th minute run at the heart of the United defence and struck a 15 yard shot that was deflected for a corner on the left. This, hit shortish to the near post was simply turned into the net by SMITH who had managed, (or been allowed) to get in front of the keeper on the goal line.

There was no immediate attempt at redress by United and Locos, energised by their early success had better possession and by and large kept United at bay in their own final third. There were a few attacks by Formartine but there was a rather predictable quality to them – play the ball up to Wood, who was generally double marked, expecting him to take it with his back towards goal and release it for McGowan, Rodger or some such. These were usually simply dealt with and United managed few if any shots on target until after the interval.

By then the game had all but slipped from their grasp. Fairly sustained Locos pressure kept them on the back foot and heavy underfoot conditions coupled torrential showers meant the likelihood of defensive errors. In the 33rd minute a swift break down the left flank by Stott set up a chance for Smith to break in from the left corner of box one on one with the advancing Main who immediately went to deck to grab the ball from the forwards' feet, bringing him down in the process. A penalty and a booking were the inevitable consequence and SMITH blasted the spot kick home himself.

United tried to redress things in the second half but struggled against a densely populated yet well organised defence. They had periods of sustained possession and clearly tried hard to get back on terms. They lacked fluency and guile and for all their pressure had little penetration until in the 73rd minute a ball whipped in low from the left by sub Greig was headed home by LISLE from close range near the back post.

That was as good as it got for United and a couple of lighting breaks by MacLean and Stott could have lengthened the Locos lead. A combination of good fortune and desperate defending prevented that but United were still well beaten.

Match report by Colin Keenan



Photography by Ian Rennie

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