THOSE charged with balancing the books at fan-run Dunfermline Athletic might rub their hands at the prospect of a big payday in the next round of the Scottish Cup should the Fifers overcome East Stirlingshire at Ochilview today, but Jim Jefferies does not share their enthusiasm.
While aware of the boost such a tie would bring, the manager is keen for his team to embark on a run in the competition.
"Ideally I would like to draw a number of lower league teams - all the way to the final," Jefferies joked. "I don't think that's too likely, though.
"Celtic, Hearts, Rangers or Aberdeen away would be great ties, but ideally you want a tie you can progress from and I think anyone at home would fall into that category. We are no pushovers at East End Park.
"But if you are lucky enough to be in the draw, then you take what you are given and make the best of it. If it is a 'glamour' tie against a bigger club, then at least we have nothing to lose and we can go there and cause a shock. But we need to get past East Stirlingshire first."
Jefferies is acutely aware that today's visit to the League Two side represents a tricky test and has warned his players that any slip-ups will be punished.
"East Stirling will raise their game, just like every team from a lower level does in cup competitions," Jefferies added.
"We know we need to be at our best to ensure we have the best chance of going through. Everyone knows we have the better team on paper and if we play very well we will win the game, simple as that.
"On a bigger scale, who would have thought Newcastle, with some of their woes this season, would have beaten Manchester City last week? No-one would have predicted that.
"Cup football can happen like that and we need to make sure that, at our own level, we don't fall foul of that."
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