SPFL Tier 4, The Rock, 13/8/22.

I didn’t see this coming. Annan did well last season. And this is the first time since 1959 we’ve won our first three league games. (Mind you, we finished sixth that season.)

A brace from Declan Byrne, one from Finlay Gray and the icing on the cake provided by Gregor Buchanan – with an assist from a trialist – John Gemmell of misty memory if Pie and Bovril is to be believed.

I’m not letting myself get carried away by this.

After all we beat East Fife 5-0 at home last September and look how the season ended.

But it is an encourgaging start.

Scottish League Cup* Group E, The Rock, 20/7/19

Well.

This isn’t looking good, is it?

I know they’re a division above us but still. Annan drew with them in midweek after all – and Annan aren’t very good.

I hate to think how many Motherwell will put past us on Tuesday night.

*Betfred Cup.

Scottish League Cup* Group E, Galabank, 13/7/19.

A win! A win I wasn’t expecting – certainly not after only signing five of the players on show within the previous forty-eight hours.

But this ought to be tempered with caution. Annan were far from impressive even if they are only one tier below us. But compare last season’s equivalent game at Spartans – two tiers below us – where we only got a draw.

With nine new players starting I had no idea who was who to begin with – apart from Kyle Hutton and Stuart Carswell, the latter now Sons captain and the stand-out player on the park.

We had the better of the early stuff, several efforts on goal (Annan’s first did not arrive till 40 mins in – their second was only a couple of minutes later but both were wide of the mark; indeed, crosses aside, Jordan Pettigrew in Sons’ goal did not have a save to make in the entire game) and a lot of corners in our favour but I still never felt our defence was comfortable. Too many years watching Sons does that to you.

New right back Lewis Crawford – a local lad – was solid and got forward well, he had our first shot on goal but it was blocked and not long after a header which unfortunately was straight at the keeper. He’s no Sam Wardrop though. Rico Quitongo on the other flank seemed defensively sound and got forward too.

Paul Crossan (P J Crossan on the club’s squad list) looked effective on the wing, reminiscent of Andy Stirling in build. He cut inside well and looks to be an upgrade on Bobby Barr.
Ryan Tierney up front held the ball up impressively but whether he’ll be able to do it against better defenders remains to be seen. He took his goal well though. Neither of our front two is on the tall side but Tierney still managed to win quite a few balls in the air. Mati Zata in midfield, though, looked like a fish out of water, not really getting into the game at all.

An Annan fan sitting near me said to his mate sometime during the second half that Dumbarton looked organised. How that’s so is a miracle given our lack of time together or maybe it’s just a reflection of Annan’s lack in that regard. Or (at the risk of getting ahead of myself and despite Sons fans less than enthusiastic embrace of the signings so far) do we simply have better players than them?

Three games against teams in higher divisions now before the league starts. Make the most of the win.

The dates for the four* games Sons will play in next season’s League Cup have been announced.

July 13^th Annan Athletic away,
July 17^th Morton away,
July 20^th Queen of the South at home,
July 23^rd Motherwell at home.

It’s an odd sequence; with two away games followed by two home ones.

*We won’t be going beyond four.

Gosh. These things come round quickly.

Sons have been drawn against Motherwell, Morton, Queen of the South and Annan Athletic.

The games are to be played between July 13^th and 27^th. No other details as yet.

The new season doesn’t take long in coming around.

Sons’ opponents in the League Cup (Betfred Cup) will be Kilmarnock, Ayr United, Clyde and Annan Athletic. Matches to be played during the second half of July.

A quick reunion with Ayr, then. Doubtless we’ll get nothing out of that. They had the hex on us last season. It’s a long time since we played Kilmarnock.

SFL Challenge Cup, The Rock, Round 1, 29/7/12.

Why do we bother entering this competition? We’ve only ever won about two games in it in its entire existence. Even newish boys Annan Athletic have a better record in it than us. East Stirlingshire and Elgin City too.

The first half was dominated by QoS. Stephen Grindlay made three good saves in the first fifteen minutes and QoS had another good chance which the boy volleyed wide. Their keeper didn’t have a save to make until just about the last kick of the half when an Agnew special made him work.

The second half was more even but our two best openings fell to James Creaney and the keeper was up to both of them. Otherwise there was a slow motion scramble on their goal line after a corner and that was about it for us. Midway through the half the game lost all cohesion with both sides resorting to balls over the top and it was from one of these that QoS scored, their tricky no 11 cutting out Grindlay with a ball back for an unopposed header. A similar incident earlier had seen their player miss what amounted to an open goal.

We lacked penetration and punch though Jim Lister can hold the ball up and win headers. I liked the look of Phil Johnston when he came on for Mark Gilhaney, willing to take on the defender and run.

The new strip is cracking though.

QoS have just been relegated from the Division we’re now in and we looked way off them.

It says it all that Stephen Grindlay won man of the match. I wouldn’t disagree.

I can console myself with the thought that we usually start slowly. We night need our usual post-Christmas good run desperately.

Edited to add:- I meant to put in that the new centre back pairing (Alan Lithgow with Andy Graham) was a bomb scare throughout. In particular Andy Graham looked very uncertain and it seemed to infect Lithgow.

SFL Div 2, The Rock, 7/5/11

Well. We’ve had four clean sheets this season in the league and I’ve seen two of them!

This was as much of a non-event as might be expected when nothing rode on it for either side but that’s two points in successive games from teams who had beaten us thrice already. Two points I thought we’d struggle for.

Here’s a typical scene from the game. All twenty outfield players within a space of about twenty by ten yards. Absolutely no width.

Dumbarton had the balance of the play but made few chances although the Forfar keeper made two good saves from Pat Walker and Andy Geggan in the second half. Stephen Grindlay barely had a save to make yet Forfar should have gone ahead late on when their forward headed it wide instead of on target.

Was Stephen Grindlay making a bid to be retained here? He actually came for two crosses. Even more astonishingly he caught them both!

In the photo below the players leave the field at the final whistle.

So Stenny made safety and Alloa face the play-offs. Interestingly our total of forty points would have seen us relegated or in the play-offs in seven of the seventeen previous seasons where there have been ten teams in Division Two.

Isn’t it bizarre though that Alloa choose now to get rid of Alan Maitland as manager? Either it ought ot have been done months ago (I gather he offered to resign but was turned down) or else they should have waited till after the play-offs. The team is hardly going to be in the best frame of mind for these crucial games. Though if he’d “lost” the dressing room then I suppose there may be an improvement. But they now face an Annan team surely on a high after making the play-offs, and if they get through that they will play a side on a roll. Wierd timing.

Galabank 18/7/09: 19/7/09

Dumbarton 1-1 Queen Of The South (6-7 on pens.)
Annan Athletic 3-3 Dumbarton (4-2 on pens.)

You can’t draw inferences for the oncoming season from pre-season games. Last season we didn’t win many pre-season encounters and it turned out well.

I must say, though, that while at the end of last season I couldn’t wait for the new one to start, as it has approached I have become more and more wary.

We have two games against higher opposition to kick off the new term; Morton in the Challenge Cup on Sunday, and Dunfermline in the CIS on Aug 1^st. The only consolation is that they are both at home.

There’s a friendly against Middlesbrough tomorrow night too, a Stirlingshire Cup tie versus the Shire to squeeze in next midweek and the squad is by no means settled. We don’t seem to have a left back. I hope things don’t fall apart.

Morton.

At least it’s at home.

We’ve not had much luck in the draws for the cups recently – except for Annan at home in the CIS last season.

Still, we did relatively well against 1st Division opposition last season (one of whom, admittedly, we will be meeting on an equal footing this.)

I’ve just looked at the BBC SFL page to check Morton’s final position and noticed – I didn’t pay that much attention to the competition after we got knocked out – that Airdrie actually won it last time out. We really ought to have beaten them in the first round.