Reunions galore as Keith host Huntly in the Aberdeenshire Cup
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KEITH co-manager Andy Roddie has insisted there will be “nothing extra” at stake when his side take on local rivals Huntly in the Aberdeenshire Cup tomorrow night.
While Roddie and fellow co-manager Tommy Wilson used to manage Huntly, the Black and Golds’ current boss Allan Hale is a former Keith boss.
With Hale returning to Kynoch Park and Roddie and Wilson back up against their old club – onlookers may believe there will added spice to this cup quarter final.
But Roddie is sure that won’t be the case.
He said: “We know what Huntly are like, we know where their weaknesses are and we will try to expose them.
“But there is nothing extra on offer here. Not from our side.
“We treat every game as if we want to win it and this will be no different. We will just get on with the game.
“It’s a couple of wins and you’ve won the cup.
“Keith is a club that has a good history behind it and it’s been a while since we have been up and challenging for trophies, so it would be nice to do so again.”
The winner of the quarter final will go on to face Fraserburgh at home in the semi final.
Both sides come into the match off the back of opening day defeats in the Highland League – with Huntly having gone down to a 1-0 defeat at Rothes and Keith losing 2-0 at Inverurie Locos.
But there was more than enough in the performance in Inverurie to please Roddie.
He added: “We are just in the door and have only had three or four sessions with the boys. Trying to get them to understand how we want them to play is going to take longer than that.
“But there are encouraging signs, there were good individual performances and it was a good team performance on Saturday.
“I think we deserved to get something out of the game. Maybe not the three points, but a point would have been a fair reflection.
“The second goal was an unfortunate goal, which hit Marc Young and went in, and then we had a man sent-off late on – which we felt was harsh.
“We created as many chances as they did and maybe even had the better chances.
“Finishing is perhaps something we can work on.”
Fans are set to be allowed back into Kynoch Park for tomorrow’s Aberdeenshire Cup tie and also for Saturday’s home league match against Nairn County.
Nairn’s season got off to a false start on Saturday as they were forced to postpone their match with Clachnacuddin due to someone with Covid-19 coming into contact with the squad.
It remains to be seen whether they will be able to field a squad this weekend with many players having to quarantine for two weeks.
Tickets for both matches can be purchased online at www.fanbaseclub.com. Check out Keith’s social media pages for more information.
