The Friday night experiment?
It may sound like some ropey horror movie but Scottish football's trial with such end-of-the-week evening affairs has been far from hands over the eyes stuff. Dundee United 3 Kilmarnock 3, Dundee 1 Inverness Caledonian Thistle 4 . . . it's all made for rather pleasant viewing if the truth be told. Now, it's the third division's turn for Friday night lights as Hampden Park stages the first such encounter in the bottom tier.
Perhaps the change may do Queen's Park and Stirling Albion good. They could certainly do with a morale boost. The visitors, who caused a stir by beating Rangers but remain anchored to the foot of the table, will arrive in Mount Florida on a downer having leaked nine goals in their previous two outings. The hosts, meanwhile, sit in fourth, among the promotion pushers, but a not so magnificent seven matches without a win has thrown a spanner into the previously smooth-running works.
"A Friday night game is certainly something new for me but I'm sure if we win I'll become a big fan of it," said Gardner Speirs, the Queen's Park manager.
Speirs has been trying to put his finger on just what has gone wrong of late. After an encouraging start to the campaign, the Spiders have become entangled in a winless web. "We just need that result that's going to kick-start things again and get us off on a run," said the 49-year-old. "There have been games when we haven't made the right choices at times. We've been getting in good positions but have not been making the most of it, either with a disappointing final pass or a poor final shot. But form is temporary and I'm sure three points will change things."
Back in September, Speirs' men made the trek north to face Elgin City, who now sit second in the league, and conjured a thumping 4-0 win. A month later, they made the short hop to Govan and put in a spirited display during a 2-0 loss to Rangers. These two matches have proved just what the plucky part-timers are capable of but, since that robust display at a packed Ibrox, Queen's Park have suffered something of a hangover.
"One thing that we can never accuse our guys of is not putting in the effort or failing to lift themselves for any game," insisted Speirs. "We played very well at Ibrox and put in a lot of work and I do take the point that playing there in front of a big crowd was bigger than the norm and of course it was an occasion for the boys.
"But there has never been a problem with application in any game and against any team. We're just not in top form at the moment. We need a wee boost and we'll be trying hard to get that win tomorrow evening. The 4-0 win up at Elgin shows just what we can do if we get it right. We'll keep working hard and I'm sure we'll get that break we need."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article