Scottish Challenge Cup*, The Rock, 16/8/17.

The good news is that we actually won a Challenge Cup game (and a first “proper” game this season.) The bad news is it was against a team that shouldn’t be in the competition in the first place.

I am of the opinion (shared with many fans of smaller clubs) that the inclusion of “Colts” teams in this cup is a stalking horse for introducing them to the league system, an innovation which would then destroy the SPFL lower leagues as a meaningful competition.

If the “big” clubs want their younger players to develop why not play them in the first team, or bring back their reserve league, or loan them out to other clubs as happens at the moment? I know in Spain, for example, “reserve” teams are allowed in the league at a lower level but in Scotland there is only the short-lived and quickly scrapped C Division in the late 1940s and early 1950s in which such participation was allowed. It is simply not part of our footballing culture and would only contribute to the further disregarding of the smaller clubs – whose interests are routinely not taken into account by the authorities, swayed as they are by the influence of the most supported clubs. In any case there is no way in which Scotland could ever in the future resemble Spain in footballing terms.

In the next round Sons have the unusual prospect of a game against a Welsh club, Connah’s Quay Nomads. I don’t know if we’ve ever played a Welsh club before, certainly not in a competitive match.

*Officially the Irn Bru Cup