Date	Saturday, 09 April 1988
Competition	Highland League
Fixture/Score	Ross County 1:2 Cove Rangers
Venue	Victoria Park
Referee
Ross County
Manager	Robert (Bobby) Wilson
Starting 11	1: John Sutter, 2: Christopher (Chris) Somerville, 3: Scott Lemmon, 4: Cameron Robertson, 5: Dave Bellshaw, 6: Don Cowie (SNR), 7: Keith (Billy) Ferries, 8: Albert Allan, 9: James MacKay 1, 10: Gordon Connelly, 11: Donald MacKay
Bench	0: Alan Gair, 0: David MacRae
Attendance
Match Report	Report from the Ross-shire Journal. Ross County 1 Cove Rangers 2 WHEN Ross County opened the scoring in the 12th minute with a brilliantly taken goal—the result of a combination between the Mackay members of the team—it seemed more could follow, so well executed had been the move. Donald Mackay, with his back to the goal on the edge of the six-yard box on the right of the field, neatly turned with the ball, and in almost the same movement, flighted it across the area to James Mackay, coming up unmarked, and he had the simplest of tasks. Playing conditions were a complete contrast to those experienced most of the season, following an early week spell of warm, dry weather. The surface was firm; it was holding; it was fiery; and the ball was coming off it at times like a bullet. As a result, players had to re-adjust to the situation as it arose, for shots came at them from all angles at a pace it was sometimes difficult to judge. Summer football is here, and on the day, Cove Rangers were the better “adjusters”, and any breaks that were going went to them. County’s last competitive game had been the Cup final a fortnight previously, and it showed! The return of Dave Bellshaw, after his long spell of inactivity recovering from his facial injury, showed too, in that he lacked match practice, and that confident sweep on the ball, which he had, was perhaps a “wee bit rusty”. As it was, Dave made two or three goalline clearances, and then blotted his copy-book with a pass-back that lacked his pre-injury confidence—it was not firm enough, and was made at a time when a flick to the side would have led to a sure clearance by a colleague. As it was, luckless Dave half-hit the ball back to John Suttar in the 65th minute, and Leiper nipped in and scored easily. Try as they might after that, Ross County, with every outfield player pressing forward, could do little to break the Rangers’ defence, with the visitors snapping up the loose ball and ending a swift attack with a well-timed tackle or clearance. Ross County had looked at the start as if they could have swept everything before them, but in the end struggled valiantly to save the game and a point. Fortune was not on their side on the day, though they deserved a share of the points. Cove had equalised County’s 12th-minute goal four minutes from half-time, when the home defence was caught out by a cross ball from Glover, which was smartly headed home by fullback Brown. County had their chances, but if their approach work overcame a stuffy defence, keeper Allan Gunn (Invergordon), brother of Norwich City’s Bryan Gunn, was always handy to deal with any dangerous shots.