Buckie Thistle became record breakers as they recorded their 21st Breedon Highland League win in a row in a comfortable 4-0 win at local rivals Deveronvale.
The record had stood since season 1986-87 when Inverness Thistle won 20 successive games.
The result leaves Buckie one point behind leaders Fraserburgh with only four games remaining.
Buckie assistant manager Lewis MacKinnon praised his players for their consistency.
He said: “It’s amazing to think we have been able to do this and are still a point behind Fraserburgh in the race for the title.
“To be honest, we need a favour from any of their opponents in the remaining fixtures while we have to keep on winning and see what happens.”
MacKinnon felt that his team were deserved winners against Vale and could have won by a greater margin.
He added: “It was a good days work as we got the points, scored four goals and kept a clean sheet which was the objective we set the players.
“The pitch was really difficult to play good football on but we took the chances which came our way.
“We should really have had more goals with the only real worry being Shaun Wood who had to come off with a cut above his left eye but hopefully he will be fine for Wednesday at Forres.”
Wood had broken the deadlock after 17 minutes when he capitalised on fine play by the dangerous Andy MacAskill to fire home a low shot from 16 yards.
MacAskill then saw his delivery from a corner pick out Jack Murray whose header was cleared off the line by Robbie Allan but the Buckie defender saw his second header find the target four minutes later.
MacAskill deserved a goal and he obliged with a fine shot from 10 yards after 28 minutes and the only surprise was that it took until ten minutes from time for Kyle MacLeod to head home number four after MacAskill was denied by the crossbar.
Vale manager Craig Stewart had no complaints about the result and praised Buckie for their record-breaking run.
He said: “You can’t defend how we did and expect to get anything from the game against a side who have been on an unbelievable run.
“We were better in the second half but every goal we lost was avoidable and we need to show a bit more hunger to stop them.
“Andy MacAskill showed why is one of the five best players in the league.
“The good thing for us was we got players like Rob Scott, Sam Robertson, Caiden Imbert-Thomas and Kyle MacKillop-Hall back on the pitch.”
FT | Final score from Princess Royal Park, where it ends in defeat for the Vale.
🔴⚪️ pic.twitter.com/pxq172awKz
— Deveronvale Football Club (@DeveronvaleFC) March 26, 2022
Rothes 2-3 Strathspey Thistle
Rothes suffered a surprise 3-2 defeat at home against second-bottom Strathspey Thistle.
Speysiders boss Ross Jack said: “It was an abject performance from ourselves to say the least.
“It was the total opposite of Wednesday night’s game at Buckie (a 2-1 defeat). All that was good at Victoria Park was totally lacking from this game.
“We created loads of chances, we got one penalty and on another day we might have had three or four.
“Right at the end we should have had a stonewall one, the linesman said it was a spot-kick, but the referee over-ruled him. It was just one of those days.”
The hosts made a promising start when Ross Gunn fired them ahead in the 18th minute but within minutes the visitors were back on level terms when Dylan Lawrence netted from a Ross Logan pass.
Rothes regained the lead from an Alan Pollock penalty kick after Gunn was impeded in the box but Strathspey battled back with striker Kris Duncan, a former Rothes player, grabbed an unlikely equaliser when he hammered home a James McShane back-post header.
In the 90th minute youngster Jordan Shaw notched the winner from another superb threaded pass from Logan.
Strathspey manager Charlie Brown said: “It was a much-needed victory for ourselves, but it’s one I’ve seen coming over the last few weeks so the three points were a great reward for all the effort the boys have put in.
“This really is massive for us as we’ve had a few decent performances where we’ve not had the rub of the green but today we managed to bounce back from going a goal down on two separate occasions so we showed a great team spirit.”
