After missing last week’s 7-1 thrashing of Rothes in the Highland League Cup, it was great to be back to league action again, welcoming back Rothes to Mosset Park after an enforced month off due to the recent winter weather conditions which resulted in so many games being postponed.
This mid-season lay-off seems to have invigorated the “Can Cans” as they cruised to an easy 6-2 win, sweet revenge for the 5-2 away loss back in October.
Although we were still missing a few first team regulars, most notably Stuart Soane (who scored four against them last week), it was good to see the goals shared among six different scorers, even though our third goal was given by the linesman, when from where I was standing it looked as though it didn’t even cross the goal line! I’m sure many Forres fans were asking – can we play you every week?
However, we could and should have scored many more against a poor Rothes performance, their two goals only coming by way of gifts from our keeper Stuart Knight, who let two high balls slip through his hands thus leaving his goal wide open for them to score easily, maybe it’s time for Stuart to have a good look at his gloves and change them.
Rothes finished the game with only 10 men after Andrew Corbett was sent off near the end for two bookable offences in as many minutes, but I think they should have been down to nine men after their captain, Michael Dunn, complained at every single decision taken by the match officials against his team, his management team and even when his team mates made mistakes – the foul and abusive language used being very choice to say the least and worthy of a red card alone. Not a great example to all the young fans present.
It was really good to see that the referee finally had the use of the magic white spray for free kicks, albeit it was only used in the second half, and thus ensured that the defensive walls for both teams were the full 10 yards back – something that is long overdue.
With some of the recently postponed games now being re-arranged, I have to question the wisdom of the decision for us to play Fort William away on a Wednesday night. Just how many of our fans do the SHFL expect us to make that trip?
With all the leagues now playing on any given day of the week then why couldn’t this have been arranged to play on a Sunday when I’m sure we would have been able to take some fans down there to keep the attendance as high as possible, a decision I’m sure that Fort William would greatly appreciate, again re-arranged fixtures made for the benefit of the SHFL and not any thought for the travelling away fans.