Date	Saturday, 20 October 1990
Competition	Scottish Qualifying Cup
Fixture/Score	Ross County 1:3 Cove Rangers
Venue	Victoria Park
Referee	Bill Machray
Ross County
Manager	Robert (Bobby) Wilson
Starting 11	1: Michael Ure, 2: Christopher (Chris) Somerville, 3: Robert Allan, 4: Robert (Robbie) Williamson, 5: Johnston Bellshaw, 6: Scott Lemmon, 7: Keith (Billy) Ferries 1, 8: Cameron Robertson, 9: Alan Duff, 10: Gordon Connelly, 11: Albert Allan
Bench	0: Barry Wilson, 0: Brian Grant
Attendance
Match Report	Match Report Report by Bill McAllister for the Press & Journal. Ross County 1 Cove Rangers 3 Cove Rangers' bid for their first senior trophy will not founder on underestimating Fraserburgh. The Allan Park club were installed as Qualifying Cup favourites after their thrilling semi-final success over Ross County at Dingwall. But club chairman Alan McRae, mindful of defeats in last year's Qualifying Cup final and this years League Cup final, said: "There's no way we can count our chickens. Fraserburgh are there on merit, having knocked out good teams and we've not won anything yet at this level. "We produced great efforts to knock out Peterhead, Caley and Ross County, and it will take just as big an effort if we are to go on and lift the cup." Mr McRae indicated that Cove would today propose Huntly as the venue for the final on November 17 and would oppose any suggestion of playing it at Peterhead. Aberdeen are at home that day, which ruled out any consideration of Pittodrie. Cove sweeper Ronnie Brown who limped off early in the second half with an ankle knock, will have treatment tonight, but is very doubtful for tomorrow's league trip to Rothes. But 18-year-old Scott Paterson, pulled back from midfield, did an excellent job as stand-in sweeper in his team's 3-1 win. The big fellow is an out-standing prospect and manager Dave Watson admits: "All Scott needs is to have the same faith in himself that his teammates, and myself, have in him." Cool, confident Cove had no failures as they seized the game by the scruff of the neck and never allowed County to turn on the silky stuff which had taken them to the top of the table. The tremendous work rate of front trio Donald Smith, Mike Megginson and Raymond Yule produced stress cracks in the Dingwall defence, while the sheer power of Mike Cormack and the terrier-like activity of Doug Baxter harassed and befuddled the normally talented Ross midfield. Baxter's run set up CORMACK's header for the opener, then the former Huntly player seized on Albert Allan's disastrous pass-back to allow MEGGINSON to tap the ball into an empty net for a two-goal lead inside 20 minutes. SMITH's diving header had Cove on easy street with half an hour to go and they could afford to lose a bizarre goal. Steve BECKETT, who had played so well, astonishingly dropped the ball into his own net after Billy Ferries had thumped it in from just over the half-way line. Manager Watson said: "Things are coming right for us, but we've got to keep this attitude going." Ross boss Bobby Wilson said: "Our team froze as the occasion got to them. We've thrown away a golden chance of our first Qualifying final in 17 years. "By the time we started to play we were three down and had left ourselves with a mountain to climb."