Stirling Albion are set to make their big return to Forthbank tomorrow – with manager Darren Young admitting his squad are champing at the bit to play in front of the Binos faithful.
They played their first pre-season fixture in front of fans on Tuesday evening with a comfortable 5-0 away win to Lowland League side Civil Service Strollers.
It represents a perfect start to pre-season for Young’s charges after a 6-0 win over Dundonald Bluebell in their debut fixture, but the Albion boss is aware of the step up that awaits.
Championship side Arbroath will form the challenge for the big home return – and provide an important litmus test ahead of the beginning of competitive action with the visit of Ayr United in the Viaplay Cup a week later.
Young declared himself happy with his side’s latest run-out, which featured a double from Dale Carrick alongside strikes from Ross McGeachie, Kieran Moore and new signing Dale Hilson.
The Albion manager said: “It was great, another clean sheet and lots of minutes under the belt, although we had a couple of injuries there that put a wee dampener on things.
“Civil Service put up a good show to be fair and made us work hard for it. We tried hard to be patient and to break down, got hold of the ball, moved it sideways and then on the occasion we managed to get it through them, we did well and got a few goals from it.
“We managed to get six of the young players on the pitch and they all played their part and did very well.
“Dale had a wee niggle so we didn’t want to take any chances with him but he came straight on and got a goal straight away – you can see how big a player he will be for us.
“It was great all round and being greedy, we could have had another couple and defensively, I thought we were really good and working really hard to defend the box.
“It’s more minutes in the tank, more goals and it was a different style. They sat off us a wee bit so it was up to us to break them down and we got more control as the game went down.”
The threat posed by Dick Campbell’s men at the weekend will be the perfect warm-up ahead of the Viaplay group stage, which also features games against Premiership St Johnstone and League One rivals Alloa Athletic.
But Young is looking forward to getting back in front of the Binos fans after last season’s glorious campaign.
He added: “We’ve got a hard test against Arbroath on Saturday and we have three players coming back from holiday so they will come back into the reckoning for that to get minutes into their belt.
“It will be good to get the fans back in, hopefully we can get a decent turnout and we look forward to that.”
