News

GOALS from captain Mitch Megginson and defender Harry Milne gave us a thoroughly deserved 2-0 victory over Peterhead at a very windy Balmoor Stadium.

Stuart McKenzie did his bit with some classy goalkeeping in the early stages before helping to set up the opener in a match we controlled with calmness and confidence, despite the tricky conditions.

Peterhead had the advantage of playing with the mini-gale at their backs in the first half but ​were repelled by the excellence of McKenzie and some top notch defending by the four men immediately in front of him, Milne, Strachan, Higgins and Scott Ross.

Once we had taken the lead, when Megginson netted his third of the campaign just after the half-hour, there was never any real doubt about who would be picking up the three points.

Left-back Milne’s first of the campaign, from a perfectly placed low drive early in the second period, was the icing on the cake in a highly impressive team performance.

McKenzie made the first of his saves in the sixth minute, when he used his legs to block a 10 yard shot from Steven Boyd.

The big keeper followed that by stretching to push a long range effort from Alan Cook over his bar in the 11th minute.

That sparked us into life and we almost took the lead in the 14th minute.

Megginson laid the ball off to Jamie Semple and his shot from just inside the Peterhead area was pushed wide of the post by the diving Josh Rae.

Jamie Masson played the resulting corner short to Megginson then collected the return pass before blasting in a low shot that Rae also did well to save.

McKenzie made another crucial stop in the 25th minute when he tipped Ryan Conroy’s free-kick from wide on the right, which had got caught up in the wind, over his crossbar.

The big keeper capped his earlier heroics by then starting the move that saw us take the lead in the 32nd minute.

His long pass out from a goal-kick, against the the strong wind, was inch perfect to Leighton McIntosh, out on the right.

The former Peterhead striker quickly fed the ball forward to MEGGINSON, who brushed past a defender then scored with a powerful shot from the edge of the area that went in off the inside of Rae’s left post.

It was no more than we deserved for the way we had handled the difficult conditions and it might have been 2-0 seconds before the interval when Semple’s clever flick sent McIntosh away on the right but his dangerous cross into the six yard box was cleared.

We totally dominated the second period, which started with Masson playing the ball to Connor Scully, who lashed a powerful 19-yard shot just wide of Rae’s left post.

Centre-back Higgins stepped forward in the 51st minute to try his luck from a 25-yard free-kick but his effort cleared the crossbar by a foot or so.

Our second goal arrived in the 55th minute after Megginson had made a brilliant turn to shake off his marker as he latched on to a through pass from Scully.

Megginson then tried to square the ball across the face of the Peterhead goal and when it broke back into the path of MILNE his low 12 yard shot bulleted into the far corner of the net.

Rae was forced to make another good save, after Scott Ross had back-headed a cross from a Scully corner goalwards, as we went in search of another.

The Blue Toon’s only real attack of the half ended with McKenzie making another impressive stop from Boyd’s close range header, after Conroy had sent a corner over from the right, in the 80th minute.

The match ended with Masson curling in a 22-yard free-kick that Rae touched over his crossbar as we made it an impressive two wins out of two in our first season playing at this level.

PETERHEAD: Rae, Freeman, Conroy, J Brown, Bailey, McCarthy, Cameron, S Brown, Lyle (Kesson 65), Boyd, Cook

Subs: Wilson, Layne, Bakar, Trialist, Trialist.

COVE RANGERS: McKenzie, Scott Ross, Higgins, Strachan, Milne, McIntosh (Watson 80), Semple (Seb Ross 72),  Yule, Scully, Masson, Megginson (McAllister 89)

Subs:  Livingstone, Brown, Graham, Demus.

Referee: Alan Newlands

Article Copyright © 2020. Permission to use quotations from this article online is only granted subject to appropriate source credit and hyperlink to www.coverangersfc.com

MATCHDAY 2 GALLERY | PETERHEAD »