Kilchoan Fc V Coll FC - Full Report

Kilchoan FC travelled to Coll on Saturday to fulfil a promise to play an away match after last year's fixture in Kilchoan. The weather leading up to the game was dreadful but thankfully it cleared enough for the voyage to go ahead.

Tobermory based Sealife Surveys provided the transport for our party of 49 who braved the choppy 2 hour morning crossing from Kilchoan to Aringour. Sunshine broke through the clouds as we stepped ashore, and we had our resident piper, David Doherty, leading our ranks down the main road to the Coll Hotel. The home side had kindly organised minibuses to take us the 3 miles to Cliad Park where the game was to take place.

There was an impressive turnout to watch the game with almost 100 people cheering on the teams. Kilchoan's squad consisted of 14 men - a mixture of locals and ex-pats, and we also 'adopted' a few players to help bolster our team. In the squad was: Justin Cameron, Gus MacLean, Ricky Clark, Gordon MacKenzie, Stevie Canning, Donald Sinclair (Inverness), Tristan Fairbairn, Danny Anderson (Acharacle), Iain Macdonald, Richard van de Peer, Kevin Morrison (Lochgilphead), Calum MacPhail, Shaun Fisher (Bunessan) and Neil Munro (Ulva).

The game started at a ferocious pace with chances for both teams to take the lead. It was end-to-end stuff throughout the first half but Kilchoan seemed to have more possesion and it was only some fine saves from the Coll goalkeeper which stopped the men in orange making the breakthrough. Kilchoan, whose back four had a combined age of 182 years, showed their experience by snuffing out any threat from the much younger Coll team, leaving goalkeeper Justin Cameron with little to do. At half-time the score was still 0-0 but Kilchoan were confident that if we kept the same gameplan then we could take the lead in the second half. The ball was in the back of the net during the second half but this was after Coll had fouled our goalkeeper as he claimed a high ball in the air. There was a huge cheer from the home support but this was soon silenced when the referee correctly chalked off the goal and awarded Kilchoan a free kick. Kilchoan also had goalscoring oppurtunities with Richard, Calum, Gordon and Iain all coming close however after 90 minutes the game was still 0-0 so we went into extra time. Coll threatened Kilchoan early on, only for Donald to snuff out their attack and he cleared the ball up to Kevin Morrison who skipped past the last man and confidently put the ball in the back of the net. The travelling support went wild with delight and even some of the tired Kilchoan legs were jumping for joy. We managed to see out the game for a memorable win which made the post-game drinks all the more tasty back in the Coll Hotel.

Staff at the Hotel had kindly made a curry for us all which was enjoyed in the beautiful sorroundings of the hotel garden. We were all fed and watered and before we knew it it was 7pm and time to board the boat and head home. Again we were piped down to the pier and had a great send off from what seemed like the whole population of Coll. Thankfully, for a few of us especially, the homeward journey was a lot calmer than the outward one and we were soon back on the mainland where some of us continued our celebrations in the familiar sorroundings of the Kilchoan House Hotel.

All in all we had a great day and there are some people whom we have to thank. Thanks to James and Richard Fairbairns and their staff at Sealife Surveys for escorting us all safely to Coll and back. Thanks to the staff at the Coll Hotel and Cliff at the Kilchoan House Hotel for putting on food and for their great hospitality; and finally a huge thanks to the Coll boys for organising the minibuses. We look forward to returning the favour when they come over to Kilchoan next summer for the next fixture.

Iain MacDonald