02/11/22

Friday Night Live At Balmoral

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History will be made on Friday night when Balmoral Stadium welcomes the BBC Scotland cameras for the first time for a cinch Championship match.

The visit of Queen’s Park has been chosen by the national broadcaster, and midfielder Blair Yule says it’s an occasion the players are all looking forward to:

“It is exciting, I suppose it’s a bit of a reward for how well the club has done in recent years, and it’s great to see Cove Rangers in the spotlight again.”

“It’ll be another test for the boys, but we’ve faced plenty of them, and the players aren’t too focused on the game being live on TV. They’re a side we’ve met plenty of late, and all we want to do is ensure we put in a performance.”

The BBC were at training on Wednesday night, Sportscene presenter Jonathan Sutherland and his producers on hand to record a sit-down interview with Mitch Megginson and his dad, Mike, another Cove legend, which will be shown on Friday evening.

The captain netted his 200th goal against Hamilton last weekend, and Mike says that was a proud moment for all the family:

“It was really special; I was delighted for him. I think for all parents, your kids’ achievements always mean more than anything you do yourself, and that was a brilliant milestone for him.

“It was a big step for Mitch to come to Cove, stepping down from playing in the Championship with Raith and Alloa, but the club was sold to him by Keith Moorhouse and John Sheran, and he hasn’t regretted it for a minute.”

Manager Jim McIntyre will be hoping Mitch can continue to add to his goal tally after the double at New Douglas Park, but it’s not that end of the pitch that has been causing problems of late:

“There’s still real frustration about what happened at Hamilton. From 4-1 up, we should have seen the game out, and some of the defending simply wasn’t acceptable.

“Having said that, we weren’t helped by the decision to award Accies a free-kick inside the box in the 89th minute. Kyle was guilty of time-wasting, and I would have had no complaints if he had been yellow-carded, but in thirty years in the game, I’ve never seen a free-kick given under those circumstances.

“That will continue to eat away, but we can’t let it affect us. Our shape was good last week, it was individual errors that did for us, and we need to cut them out, and maintain the good attacking play, and goalscoring, of recent weeks.”

“Queen’s Park are a good team, but like us, they’ve been a bit up and down. They took a heavy defeat at Ayr, but then won convincingly at Partick Thistle, and have also had a couple of draws.

“There’s every chance it’s going to be another tight game.”

Long-term injury absentees Kyle McClelland and Scott Ross are still out, but one familiar face will be making a welcome return to the squad:

“Fraser Fyvie trained on both Monday and Wednesday, and he is back in contention for a place. We’ve not had him since the Partick game in mid-September, and any team would miss a player of his quality, so it’s a real boost to have him available again.”

Leighton McIntosh also returns to the squad, having completed his two-game ban. One or two players are carrying niggles, and they are rated fifty-fifty for the encounter with Owen Coyle’s side.

Tickets for the game can be purchased HERE

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