Lossie boss targets Grantown success
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JUDGE us against Strathspey and not our heavy defeats against high-flying Inverurie and Cove, says Lossiemouth boss Iain MacRae.
The Coasters lost 7-0 at home to unbeaten leaders Cove Rangers on Saturday, just a week after conceding nine at red-hot Locos.
Those results highlighted the yawning gap between top and bottom of the Highland League, and the respective resources available to each club.
This weekend Lossie pay a visit to fellow strugglers Strathspey and manager MacRae is asking his team to show they are better than their Grantown hosts.
The Moray side have already beaten Thistle twice this season in league and cup, and MacRae wants a hat-trick to push Lossie further away from the bottom three.
"It's games like these that I feel we should be winning," he said. "Against the likes of Locos and Cove it's very hard but we need to be taking points off the teams around about us in the table and I will be expecting that on Saturday."
The Coasters were without star player Ryan Farquhar for Saturday's loss against a Cove side rated by MacRae as one of the best he has seen in almost two decades of Highland League football.
Lossie restricted the Aberdonians to just a Dan Park goal in the first 40 minutes, but the midfielder grabbed a second before the interval and Cove stepped up their act in the second 45.
"In my eighteen years in the Highland League that's as good a team as I've played against.
"We did gift them a couple of goals but they are head and shoulders above us, they are absolutely brilliant."
"We've had three hard games in a week so I can't be too critical of the players because they put in a lot of effort and were still beaten 7-0."
MacRae revealed how he attended a club meeting before Saturday's match to discuss future plans, where he spoke about his desire to strengthen his squad this summer.
"We have a list of players that I want to take in and the board are backing us to get in the players we need."
Striker Scott Dunn returned to action from injury last week but Farquhar is rated 50-50 to play in Grantown.
Chopper came back and played half an hour against Cove so he will be fit to play against Strathspey. Ryan Farquhar is 50-50, he got injured against Deveronvale and missed Saturday. Full squad otherwise.
Strathspey have improved so we are going to have to be on top of our game. But I feel if we go there and play the way we can then I feel we should take the three points. There are no easy games in the Highland league where we are but we are looking forward to the game.
Young Trevor played in midweek and Saturday give him some game time. He is a young guy and he did well in the two games. It's all about experience at his age and he's learning and hopefully can learn more.
The heads are still high they are a good bunch of lads but with a young squad when you do get a heavy defeat its disappointing and you don't know how they will react to it. I ask them to learn from their experience, think of things they did wrong and work hard on those things and work hard for each other.
I don't think we should be losing nine goals to anybody in the league and I'm confident it won't happen again.
We have got a list of ten players and if I can get in four or five, maybe three will move on and we will go with that. We don't have tens of thousands to spend on one player, we will have to wheel and deal but I'm confident we will get there.
I'm learning about my players and it will make me a better manager and a coach as well. It's a learning curve for me as well as the players.
