A NEW youth strategy is being launched at Clachnacuddin FC, thanks to £5000 sponsorship from local construction company Tullochs.
The two-year sponsorship represents a big thank-you from Inverness Caley Thistle whose chairman, David Sutherland, is also executive chairman of Tullochs. Mr Sutherland said: “Clach were very helpful earlier this year in allowing their team manager Graeme Bennett to join Caley Thistle as director of football.
“Graeme is doing this job in an entirely unpaid capacity, but he asked me to do something for Clach.”
Money is tight at Caley Thistle these days but Mr Sutherland felt it appropriate that Tullochs should step in and make a contribution to the Highland League club.
“When we offered the cash to Clach they insisted that it go to youth development,” he added. “I hope that the links between the two clubs will continue to grow and that Clach will benefit from our plans for a Highland Soccer Academy in Inverness.”
Clach chairman David Dowling said he was delighted at Tulloch's assistance which would enable the club to bring forward its youth development plans and underpin the future of the club.
He said: “We are entering a team in the new Highland Under-18 League and we have secured players who were previously at Caley Thistle's Under-16s to add to those who have come through our own Clach Rangers side.”
Man in charge of the new youth coaching department will be Doug Mackenzie.
The club will find the sponsorship particularly invaluable at a time when the SFA have reduced their support for youth development.
LOCAL cycling champ Roddy Riddle has had another highly successful summer.
At the end of April he won through to become Scottish champion at the Scottish Olympic Time Trials at Meldons in Edinburgh.
Then in May he participated in the Ras, a nine-day race which attracts internationalists from all over the world – Roddy came 11th out of 190 of the world's top cyclists.
On 1st July Roddy was in Fife where he was part of the four-man Deeside Club team which won the Team Time Trials. Deeside has been Roddy's first-call club this season, though he still appears for the Inverness-based Moray Firth CC.
And the week after the Fife race he won the Scottish Grand Prix road race at Meldon's.
Brother Kenny doesn't race these days, so he is back home keeping shop at Bikes in Grant Street. However, cousin Eric has been getting fit for a race in Elgin on 3rd September – not cycling, but running a half marathon.
He too has been in good form this summer and came second in the Follow the Herring race at Portsoy in July.
WHEELCHAIR whizzkid Uisdean Macrae is off to Meadowbank, Edinburgh, 5-7th September to take part in Sport for the Disabled's Scottish Track and Field Championship finals. Uisdean won through to the finals of the 75-metre sprint, shot and softball in Inverness in June.
On his return, Uisdean will be starting his training regime for the Special Olympics, which take place in Cardiff in June 2001, in which he hopes to contest 100m and 1600m events. Good luck, Uisdean!