Dougie MacDuff is relishing a tricky month for Irvine Vics and reckons it’ll test his side’s promotion mettle.
The Westenders host top-of-the-league Ardrossan Winton Rovers this Saturday before visiting second-placed Lanark United.
Positive results would cement Vics’ third-placed status and push them closer to the top of the West of Scotland League Third Division.
MacDuff, who went to watch Ardrossan’s 4-0 win against Lanark at the weekend after his side’s clash at Newmains United was postponed, told the Herald: “A lot of people said Lanark were poor, but you’ve got to give credit to Ardrossan, they played really well against top of the league.
“It’s third v first on Saturday, nothing has changed much in either team since we last played them.
“Both teams know what’s at stake. I’ve said before, this is like our Champions League qualifying month as we’ve got Ardrossan on Saturday then Lanark and Vale of Clyde shortly after; that’s three teams in the top five.
“This run will see what the team is made of. I’d rather be like that, though, because it means you’re doing the right things.
“It’s a fantastic league, it’s unfortunate that midweek games will kick in and take the glow off it a wee bit. It’s a lot of travelling for teams.”
Meanwhile, MacDuff admits it’s disappointing that up to seven teams will be relegated from the Third Division due to restructuring of the leagues.
He said: “It’s disappointing, there’s teams in our league steeped in history that will go down.
“Saltcoats have been going for a lot of years, Lugar and Carluke are teams with a lot of history so it would be a shame to see them go down. It’s a two-year plan to come back up as six or seven teams will go down – but only three will come back up the next season.
“No disrespect to the teams who might come up, but they’re just starting out and some of them don’t even have their own parks and playing out of city centre pitches. But we have our own ship to look after, we didn’t have anything when I joined and it was a massive rebuilding job. We have done very well in that sense.”
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