ALLOA ATHLETIC must feel like a child who has plundered their birthday presents a week early.
They know what they are getting but they are being forced to wait before someone is prepared to hand it over to them. The destination of the third division title has been in little doubt for some time now – Alloa's run of 13 wins in 15 matches made sure of that – but the delay in the leaders clinching the championship has begun to feel somewhat prolonged.
It may finally happen today. The arithmetic is conveniently simple: should Alloa defeat Elgin City and Stranraer fail to win against Clyde then the trophy will be delivered to Recreation Park, taking pride of place next to the Challenge Cup from 2000 and the Stirlingshire Cup won by Alloa a year later.
The sums may be easy enough, yet they form an equation which detracts from the enormity of the prospective achievement. Last season was a discomfiting one for the club: a solid run of form became an unedifying stagger by the turn of the year, and at its end Alloa plunged headlong into relegation from the second division via the play-offs.
Paul Hartley took charge of the team after Allan Maitland was removed, with the former Aberdeen midfielder charged, in his first job in football management, with constructing a squad capable of restoring the club's fractured self-esteem. Gaining promotion never came up.
What has transpired, with some 21 wins achieved and 57 goals scored later, has been remarkable, then. Even if it is expected that champions offer conciliatory congratulations to their closest rivals, you
could forgive those at Recreation Park should they opt to forgo the pleasantries this time.
"I think we are going to win [the title] now it's just a matter of when we're going to do that," said Robbie Winters, the veteran striker who was recruited by Hartley in September. "The chairman has backed the manager and I think they have a great wee club there, they just need to get higher up in the leagues. I don't think any manager would want to just go along and be happy to just sit in the middle of the table or avoid relegation. We have a fresh manager who wants to go forward, a chairman who wants to back him and a very well-run club.
"With a new manager coming in, he has built a new squad. He has managed to gel the boys quite quickly and get results – it was probably a bit surprising. I think there were maybe only two players there from last year, so he's done well to get the boys gelling and get them to show what they are capable of."
Winters can count himself among those who have. At 37, the former Dundee United forward was expected to offer an experienced figure in training and an option from the bench but he has made 16 starts and has scored three times in his last four games. Hartley has yet to broach the subject of new contracts with his squad but Winters' infectious zeal would seem like a useful commodity on his side's return to the second division.
"I want to keep on going; I want to keep playing football. I still have the desire, I'm still hungry and I'm feeling good," said Winters, whose career also brought title success during a six-year spell at the Norwegian club Brann. "To go to Alloa was another challenge. Hopefully the manager wants to step up again and get promotion again [next season]. I think that's the way forward for Alloa."
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