Season 1986 / 87 – The Cups

The MacTavish Cup

Saturday 25 October 1986 – MacTavish Cup First Round – Aberdeen Camanachd 0 Skye Camanachd 7

Skye Camanachd made the long journey east to Aberdeen only to find the designated pitch for this MacTavish Cup first round tie to be unplayable. Both teams then made the trip across the city Balgownie where the game eventually took place.

Skye travelled with a make-shift squad and they found some familiar faces waiting or them on their arrival in Aberdeen. The Aberdeen Camanachd side featured John Murchison and Donnie Murchison from Bernisdale, Murdo Macleod from Kyleakin, Derek Grant from Portree as well as a tough full back in the shape of Tim Gallagher from Kingussie.

Skye played against a strong wind in a first half and most of the early stages took the form of a dour midfield battle. 

Donnie Murchison went close for the home side with a couple of snap shots which flew just over Ian “Dowel” MacLeod’s bar.

However it was another of the Murchison clan – Peter - who playing at wing forward, who broke the deadlock with a 20 yard drive which gave Skye a 1-0 half time lead.  

At the interval Skye made a tactical switch designed to take advantage of the stiff diagonal breeze in the second half. Willie MacKinnon was moved to left wing forward where he saw plenty of the wind assisted ball and player / manager Calum Murchison slotted in at full forward.

Calum Murchison made it 2-0 early in the second half and Skye went on to dominate the remainder of the game.

Aberdeen keeper Davie Simpson made 2 excellent saves before Willie MacKinnon got on the scoresheet to make it 3-0.

A Calum Murchison double completed his hat-trick to make it 5-0 as Aberdeen fought to keep the score down.

Peter Murchison added his second to take Skye’s tally to 6 and Calum Murchison notched his fourth goal to send Skye home with a resounding 7-0 victory.

Duncan MacDougall and John “Slippy” Finlayson were excellent in the Skye midfield and player / manager Calum Murchison was very effective up front.

Skye now had a trip to Invergarry to play Glengarry in the next round to look forward to.