When Lochaber last lifted the coveted Mowi Valerie Fraser Camanachd Cup in 2016, an eight-year-old Hannah MacDonald was their lucky mascot.
However, there was no luck involved as the manager’s daughter was awarded the Peter Gow player of the match accolade for her outstanding performance in Lochaber’s surprise 1-0 win over Badenoch in the Women’s Camanachd Association Cup final at the Eilan.
The team news ahead of the final surrounded the unavailability of key Badenoch player Kirsty Deans.
Hope Borthwick was declared fit to start but injury restricted skipper, Jeannete McGregor to a place on the bench.
After some close calls during a goalless 80 minutes, referee Des McNulty took the final into extra-time and the additional period was only seconds old when Hannah MacDonald’s ball from the left was fired across the keeper by Leah Maxtone.
It proved to be the winner and Lochaber captain Amy Disher was presented with the trophy by Jayne MacKay from sponsors Mowi.
A delighted Lochaber manager Andy MacDonald said: “It was a great performance, and everyone played out of their skins. We knew we had to stay in the game over the first 20 minutes and could have scored ourselves early on.
“The players have put so much effort into training and it was important for us not to lose the final before it started.
“It was a very close game, played in 23 degrees heat at times but I think we deserved the win and Leah Maxtone did the business when it mattered with a peach of a goal.
“Kira MacDonald and Mairi Duncan were terrific in defence and Hannah MacDonald had a great game too, but they were all outstanding, giving the commitment we asked for before throw up.”
Earlier in the afternoon, Inverness B beat Badenoch B 3-1 to take the Mowi Challenge Cup.
Katie Simpson and Grace Bremner gave Inverness an early advantage before Lexi Farquhar pulled a goal back. Kamryn Hughes made it 3-1 and that’s the way it ended.
Drew McNeil from Inverness said: “I thought we’d win today. We have around 19 players who could have all played so fitting them all in is a juggling act. Winning is important though as that just encourages more players to come and play shinty, and we’ll retain them on the back of that.”
Elsewhere, the South under-21s were deserved 3-1 winners in their Caol Cup clash with the North under-21s at Balgate.
Herbie Patterson showed good close control before his super strike gave the South a 16 minute lead and he added another a couple of minutes before half-time with a great volley at the back post.
Archie MacRae halved the deficit when a clearance from South keeper Gordon Currie deflected off the ‘Shiel man and into the net.
However, Herbie Patterson turned provider soon after as, following a good move, he set up substitute Sam Bulloch who crashed the ball into the roof of the net to confirm victory.
South manager Andy Watt: “We asked the boys for 100% against a strong North side and all 16 of them, including the substitutes, delivered. We could actually have had a couple of more goals in the first half and although their goal was a bit of a freak, our third from Sam gave us that bit of breathing space.
“The boys at the back were excellent but the truth is that they are all good players, but I’ll give special mention to Bute’s Marcus Planck for his performance at wing centre whilst Glasgow Mid Argyll’s Cailean MacLeod was excellent up front and Kyles Athletic defender Murdo MacRae more than played his part.
“The great thing is that the majority of the boys are eligible to play in next year’s fixture too.”
In the only league match to go ahead, Archie Millar’s hat-trick helped Skye defeat Kinlochshiel 3-0 in their Mowi North Division 1 second team derby at Rèaraig.
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