Brora Rangers boss Craig Campbell was thrilled to reach the semi-finals of the GPH Builders Merchants Highland League Cup after struggling to put a team on the pitch.
The Cattachs defeated Brechin City 2-0 at Glebe Park to earn their place in the last four despite only having 11 players available due to injury, Covid isolation and work commitments.
Brora will face Rothes or Fraserburgh away from home in the semis.
Campbell said: “I’m absolutely delighted, we came down with 11 players and we were scrambling to get a goalie.
“He was excellent for us and made a couple of good saves, I’ve got nothing but pride in the players.
“That’s up there with the best performance (of the season) because of the circumstances around the game.
“It’s been a bit stressful the last few days but the way the boys pulled together was brilliant.
“I felt it was the biggest game of the season because the league seems to be slipping away from us.
“This was a massive game for us and the boys came up with the goods.”
Keeper fitted in perfectly
One of Brora’s 11 players was goalkeeper Josh Gorton who joined on an emergency loan from Dundee Junior club Lochee United prior to the game.
The Sutherland side’s regular custodian Joe Malin was out with injury and their other stopper Ruardhri Nicol was cup-tied.
Campbell added: “Credit to Josh he met us for the first time in the changing rooms before the game and he fitted in perfectly.
“He had a couple of good saves, credit to him and we’re also thankful to Lochee for being so easy to deal with and helping us in this situation.”
Brora started well and in the 12th minute Jordan MacRae’s looping header from Gregor MacDonald’s free-kick hit the left post.
On 38 minutes the Cattachs made the breakthrough with Jamie Bain penalised for a trip on Max Ewan inside the box.
After referee Scott Lambie pointed to the spot Dale Gillespie fired into the right corner.
Three minutes later Brechin’s best chance of the night arrived, but Gorton did well to block Garry Wood’s header at point-blank range.
Just shy of the hour mark Brora made the tie save. Gregor MacDonald’s corner was bundled against the left post by Mark Nicolson.
Although the home side managed to clear, Ally MacDonald sent the ball back into the danger zone and with the home defence static MacRae nipped in to head home.
Unacceptable display
Brechin manager Andy Kirk said: “I’m hugely disappointed, Brora totally deserved to win the game. They outfought us, they outrun us, they out battled us.
“That’s something I can accept that. The work people put in at this club and we ask them to give us everything they have for 90 minutes and they’ve let us down massively.
“This season we’ve had levels of consistency and then we seem to throw a performance like that in, but that was totally unacceptable.
“The minimum you can do is run and compete as hard as the opposition, if you do that sometimes it’s your day, sometimes it’s not.
“It’s a chance to win something that’s gone. The performance didn’t need to be pretty in cup competitions it’s about getting through.
“But the performance wasn’t pretty and there wasn’t any level of intensity to go and win a football match.”