Forres played their last home game of the 2014/15 season on Wednesday, April 1 against an Inverurie Loco Works side who, like us, can only look back at this season and think of just one word to sum it up – DISAPPOINTING.
A decent crowd turned up to watch this mid-table tussle but it was the home fans who left the happier as we snatched a dramatic injury-time winner despite playing nearly 50 minutes with only 10 men.
Forres took the lead in the first half when Steven Fraser popped up to power home a header to give us a deserved lead, his fifth goal of the season.
But we were reduced to 10 men shortly before half time when captain Graeme Grant was red carded for what was deemed a goal scoring opportunity.
The second half saw Paul Smith and Dachi Khutsishvili come on to replace Kris Duncan and Duncan Jones, and with the rejig, it left Lee Fraser as the lone striker.
Inverurie took advantage of the extra man and threw everything at the resolute Forres defence, if it wasn’t for some last ditch tackles, great saves from Stuart Knight and various defenders putting their bodies on the line to block shots, then they would have equalised a lot earlier then they did. But equalise they did when a free kick from Neil Mclean was missed by everybody and crept in at Stuart Knight’s left-hand post.
The writing looked on the wall for another defeat.
Inverurie’s Andy Hunter had to be stretchered off after a fair but hefty tackle from Paul Smith which meant that there would be several minutes of injury-time added on.
Forres then put on Ross Archibald for the tiring Scott Moore and this proved pivotal as with his pace he forced more of the Inverurie players back into defence. The substitution finally paying off when, on the counter attack, Lee Fraser passed infield to the “wee man” who prodded it past Andy Reid to spark wild celebrations.
At the final whistle, the Forres players stayed on the pitch for the now customary presentations to the best players of the year, this always being done on the last home fixture of the season. Voting slips were handed out to all who attended tonight’s game to vote for their choice as top performer of the 2014/15 season, this being won by Stuart Soane, who was presented with the Donnie McCulloch Memorial Trophy.
The second award was for the match programme’s player of the year, this being voted for by a different supporter at every home game giving 10,5 and 3 points respectively to the three players who they think performed well on that day, this then being tallied up over the season. The winner this year was Lee Fraser who received a cash bonus sent over by the main sponsor, Maurice Hickey from Melbourne, South Australia.
CONGRATULATIONS TO BOTH PLAYERS – WELL DESERVED.