Working Hard

Dougie Bell spoke to the official website this afternoon as the first team squad continued to prepare for Saturday’s visit of Hamilton to Broadwood:-

“Rab Kielty took the boys this morning as we concentrated today on fitness work. Later on tonight I’ll be taking a mixture of players from our under-19 side and guys on the fringes of the first team up to Stenhousemuir to play in a Reserve Cup match.

“We’ve done well in this competition to date and it would be good to keep the run going. After tonight we have further games against Hamilton, Thistle and Queen’s Park.

“The Reserve Cup has been an excellent competition for us as it’s given us the opportunity to keep players who are not starting for the first team match fit. Although in saying that I do have to be careful tonight as our squad is not the biggest and we can’t afford any injuries.

“I think Christian Smith needs an extra game so he will play and I would expect the guys who were on the bench on Saturday to feature too. However, because its an artificial pitch I’ll not field Stevie Masterton although he would have benefited from another 90 minutes.”

One player who will not be featuring is Marvyn Wilson, who underwent an appendix operation last week and will be missing from action for the next few weeks.

Dougie also reflected briefly on the weekend: “The fans gave us great backing and I enjoyed the atmosphere but management is not for me. I love coaching and I will do my best to keep things ticking over until the new man is appointed and we’ll see what happens after that.”

Tonight’s Reserve League Cup game against Stenhousemuir takes place at Ochilview with a 7.30pm kick-off.