November 20th 2023
WASTEFUL Nairn County could have bagged a hatful of goals at Strathspey Thistle but had to settle for just the two with Jordan MacRae and Dylan Mackenzie on target for the visitors in victory at Seafield Park. Manager Ronnie Sharp is calling on his players to be hungry for more in front of goal and continue relentlessly if they edge ahead in games. He said: "We need to want to score goals all the time like the top teams in the Highland League do. When they get 2-0 up, they keep going and going but we are just lacking that final cutting edge at the moment and the last third of the park is a problem area for us." "We scored two early goals and we felt we should have gone on and scored a few more to get the confidence up. That never happened though because of our decision-making in the last third but I have been saying that for the last few weeks." He added: "The points were the most important thing today – we needed the win. It was not our best performance of the season by any stretch of the imagination. We played better the week before against Cove and lost that game, so we will take the points but we cannot take much else from it." Sharp made a solitary change to his starting line-up and with a dearth of fully fit defensive options, it meant that Kenny McKenzie continued at the back while Dylan Maclean replaced Stephen Foster between the posts. "I thought Dylan well," said Sharp. "He has been doing well in training and played well for the under-20s on Monday night, so we thought we would give him another shot in goal. I have no complaints with how he played and I thought our defence was good as well. That has been the strong point of late for us and I think we are beginning to play well together as a unit." "We were also without quite a few important players today as well, so we still have a few to come back in, including Callum Maclean, who will strengthen the defence. It is good to see." One of the highlights of the game was MacRae's sublime pass which set Mackenzie up to net County's second of the game just 20 minutes in. "I thought it was an excellent finish," stated Sharp. "He rounded the goalkeeper and the pass from Jordan was very good. It was then a good finish by Dylan with his left foot once he went past the goalkeeper. Jordan's goal was also an excellent finish from him but we need to do more in the last third." Graeme Macleod
