Despite having seven players missing for a variety of reasons, McBookie.com Superleague champions and leaders Banks o’ Dee crushed Colony Park at Spain Park, firing eleven goals without reply.
Mark HAMILTON opened the scoring on the quarter of an hour mark and that was the only goal until four minutes before the break, when Michael PHILIPSON made it two and then, on the stroke of half-time, Jack HENDERSON converted the third.
Two minutes after the restart, Mark GILMOUR made it four and then Jamie BUGLASS got in on the act with the fifth in the 52nd minute.
An own goal on the hour mark was followed by the second from BUGLASS with a quarter on an hour remaining and a couple of minutes later substitute Lachie MacLEOD knocked home the eighth, with the ninth following shortly afterwards from the same player.
With three minutes to go, BUGLASS completed his hat-trick, with GILMOUR notching his second 60 seconds later to complete the scoring.
While happy with the outcome, Spain Park boss Jamie Watt was not totally satisfied with the performance. saying: “It was a good display after the interval, but the first half wasn’t great.
“We had a couple of suspensions, a couple missing due to Covid, work commitments and knocks, but most of these guys will be available for the Aberdeenshire Cup game with Inverurie Locos on Wednesday.”
Dee have a host of tough matches coming up before the end of the month.
Watt added: “We have Locos midweek, the Scottish Junior Cup at the weekend and then Linlithgow Rose in the Scottish Cup later in the month, so we’ll need to utilise our whole squad.”
And with Harthill Royal having to make the journey north on Saturday, Watt believes the artificial surface of Spain Park gives his squad a big advantage before a ball has been kicked.
He said: “If we win, we’re at home again in the next round. For the past three seasons, we’ve been at home for the first couple of rounds and then we’ve been drawn away in Ayrshire to the likes of Kilwinning, Auchinleck and Glenafton.
“It’s a competition we’d like to go a lot further in than we have in recent times and hopefully that might be the case this season.”
Watt also confirmed, with the Superleague now included in the SFA Pyramid system, an eventual elevation to the Highland League is something Dee are keen on, explaining: “The chairman always said that if we were part of the pyramid, we’d be looking to make the step up.
“But there’s still a lot of work to be done with the likes of Bridge of Don Thistle, Culter and Hermes keeping us on our toes.”
League Cup action
It’s League Cup action all the way this evening with eight group matches taking place (kick-offs 7 pm).
There are two Section 6 games with Culter welcoming first division pacesetters Stoneywood Parkvale and Banchory St. Ternan visiting Glentanar.
Colony Park entertain Ellon United in Section 4 and, at Denmore Park in Section 8, Hall Russell host neighbours Hermes. The one Section 3 clash is at Pleasure Park where Fraserburgh United make the trip to face Maud, with Glenury Park the venue for the Section 7 meeting of Stonehaven and Bridge of Don Thistle.
East End are at at Newmachar United in Section 5, with Whitehills having home advantage in the Section 1 encounter with Forres Thistle.
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