Craig Campbell praised Brora Rangers as they kept the pressure on the sides above them in the Breedon Highland League by thrashing Strathspey Thistle 8-1.
The Cattachs remain sixth in the table after their impressive win at Dudgeon Park.
But they have three games in hand on the top two (Fraserburgh and Inverurie) and a game in hand on Brechin (third), Rothes (fourth) and Buckie (fifth).
After defeat in the North of Scotland Cup final manager Campbell has been pleased with response, following up victory at Wick by defeating Strathspey.
He said: “That’s two victories and we’ve scored a few goals as well.
“It’s a pleasing reaction, it’s all about racking up wins and trying to cling onto the pack until we play our games in hand and see where that takes us.
“We made it a little bit difficult for ourselves in the early spells of the game.
“We went 1-0 up but Strathspey got themselves back into the game and we were a little bit sloppy at times.
“Gregor (MacDonald) scored a spectacular goal to make it 2-1 and I thought we were pretty comfortable after that.
“We demand that the players keep going, we want them to get more goals and kill the game off.
“We did that and scored some really good goals which is pleasing because we wanted to play from the back, express ourselves and play the right way.”
Both sides strike early
The home side took the lead in the third minute with Jordan MacRae’s cross from the right turned into his own net by Ashley Ballam.
Shortly after MacRae hit the top of the crossbar with a strike from the edge of the area.
But Strathspey also posed a threat with Jake Thomson curling an effort into the hands of Joe Malin.
The Jags equalised in the 11th minute with Kris Duncan finding space on the left before laying the ball off for Craig MacKenzie to finish into the bottom left corner from the edge of the box.
After half an hour Brora retook the lead with Gregor MacDonald hammering a left-foot shot into the top left corner from 25 yards – goalkeeper Robbie Donaldson had no chance.
Two minutes later it should’ve been 3-1 with MacDonald surging forward from his own half and teeing up MacRae, but Donaldson saved.
From the corner which followed Thistle broke forward with Cameron Lisle, who found Duncan inside the box, but the striker was crowded out before getting his shot away.
In the 41st minute the Cattachs added to their lead with Mark Nicolson heading home MacDonald’s inswinging corner from the right.
Just before the half-time whistle went Matthew Wright added the fourth, lobbing Donaldson after Joe Malin’s punt forward evaded the visiting defence.
Lead increases
On 51 minutes Brora notched their fifth with Max Ewan’s cross from the left put into his own net by Strathspey defender Ewan Neil.
Strathspey to their credit kept going, but Brora threatened to add more with Donaldson making an excellent double save to deny first Alasdair Sutherland then Andrew Macrae and Colin Williamson’s header from a Dale Gillespie corner clipped the bar.
MacDonald added a stunning sixth in the 84th minute curling a free-kick from 25 yards into the right corner.
Williamson added further gloss to the scoreline a minute later, bursting through before rounding Donaldson to finish.
In the 86th minute it got worse for Strathspey with Wright adding his second with another lob beyond Donaldson.
Disappointment for Brown
Jags boss Charlie Brown said: “I’m very disappointed with the result. Performance-wise we could have done better with the goals and in front of goal
“We were in the game at 2-1 and then in the last five minutes of the first half long balls caught us out and naive defending cost us.
“We’ll look at that at training and see what sort of reaction we get from the defenders.
“But it’s all over the park – it’s not just the defenders – we need to be defending as team, going with runners and stopping balls coming into the box.”