Inverness & District F.A.

Premier Division

Monday 14th July 2025

Kick Off 19.00 On Time!

Black Rock Rovers 3 Loch Ness Thistle 1, attendance 38

18’ 1-0

54’ 2-0

58’ 2-1

85’ 3-1

@ Black Rock Recreation Park (Culcairn Park)

Glenglass Road

Evanton

IV16 9YT

No Admission or Programme.

As I’ve found out on previous trips to Inverness, the fixtures for this league only appear on the league’s Facebook page at very short notice. I knew of one game tonight, thanks to the social media accounts of Maryburgh, who had an away game on the multi pitch set up at Bught Park in Inverness, but at 10 o’clock this morning the league page had all four games shown for tonight and the game at Black Rock Rovers looked more appealing. They play in the village of Evanton, just north of Dingwall. It’s just a pitch in a recreation ground, with a changing room building that had a small overhang on the front and a small car park, but there was plenty of roadside parking too, with a few of the crowd choosing to watch from their cars, rather than brave the elements. Heavy rain was forecast from 5 o’clock through to midnight and sure enough, an hour later than predicted, it arrived. The pitch certainly looked like it could do with a watering, so it was never going to be a problem of whether or not the game would go ahead okay.

The match was 3rd versus 6th (out of 8) in the league table and was an excellent contest from start to finish, with an end to end flow for the full ninety minutes. Black Rock opened the scoring after eighteen minutes, when a cross from the right was fired back across the six yard box and went in off a defender attempting to clear the ball. They almost doubled their lead in the last minute of the half, but the shot came back off the crossbar. They wasted another great chance to increase their lead seven minutes into the second half, but blazed a shot high over the crossbar, when it looked easier to score, but two minutes later they did add a second goal, when a through ball was finished one on one against the ‘keeper, despite the scorer looking to be well offside. Loch Ness were back in it four minutes later, when a quick break down the left saw a shot saved by the ‘keeper, but the follow up squeezed in at the near post. Black Rock saw a mishit cross come back off the crossbar as they looked to make the game safe, finally getting their third goal with five minutes left, when a ball cut back from the left was smashed in at the far post.