Scorries extend 100% home record with emphatic win
WICK ACADEMY 4, HUNTLY 0
Scorers – Macadie (3), Geruzel (44, 56), Mackay (75).
ACADEMY warmed up for tonight’s crunch match against Nairn County with an emphatic 4-0 win over Huntly at Harmsworth Park on Saturday.
With three games to go, the focus for the club is maintaining its 100 per cent record at home for the first time in its 18-year Highland League history.
With high winds swirling round the park, it was a good day to make use of the long ball and Huntly thought they had put it to good use by taking the lead in less than 30 seconds.
David Booth sent a long ball in from his own half, causing a stramash in the Wick penalty box between opposition players. The ball eventually found its way to Paul McCarthy who lashed it into the net only to find he was offside.
Academy took the lead two minutes later when it was a case of third time lucky after James Pickles and Lukasz Geruzel both had shots blocked by the Huntly defence.
The ball found its way to Richard Macadie, who the visitors claimed used a hand to control the ball but referee Douglas Ross dismissed the protests to allow the club’s top scorer to fire in the opener.
Huntly responded well and could have equalised on the half-hour mark when Booth got the better of Pickles to drive down the right and send in a cross to Andrzej Kleczkowski who was left with an open goal but could not get his head on the ball to the relief of the home crowd.
Davie Allan was involved in a tussle and appeared to be held back by Russell Guild in the Huntly penalty box but referee Douglas adjudged it was the Wick player who had committed the foul. The decision brought an angry response from Allan, whose protests earned him a yellow card.
Wick doubled their lead a minute before the interval when Macadie used his devastating pace down the right wing to send a cross into the box to leave an unmarked Geruzel to lash home from six yards.
The Pole got on the scoresheet again on the 56th minute in a breakaway counter attack which saw Allan one on one with goalkeeper Shaun Barney, who ended up in a collision in their effort to get to a long ball from Macadie first. Geruzel was left alone in the 18-yard box to collect the ball and tap it over the line.
Huntly manager Dave McGinlay thought Wick’s first three goals should have been disallowed due to a handball and two offside calls which he thought were missed but he had no complaints about the fourth.
Pickles sent a defence-splitting pass from midfield to find Sam Mackay on the left wing, who used his pace to run around the goalkeeper and slot home from the tightest of angles on the edge of the penalty box for a comfortable win.
The game also saw the welcome return of Wick-born Huntly captain Grant Campbell who almost got on the scoresheet in the dying minutes with a spectacular 20-yard drive but the ball sailed inches wide of the right-hand post.
Wick – Gray, M. Steven, Manson, Farquhar, Shearer, Pickles, Cunningham (McKiddie 75), Mackay (R. Allan 79), Geruzel, Macadie, D. Allan (Weir 70). Subs (not used) – G. Steven, More.
Huntly – Barney, Campbell, Davidson, Gray, Dorrat, Clark, Guild (Madle 45), McCarthy, (Jarosiewicz 70), Kleczkowski (Thoirs 45), Booth, Stewart. Subs (not used) – Mckenzie, Scott.
Referee – Douglas Ross.