The prospect of playing an extra six matches in the revamped and rebranded Challenge Cup was not a particularly appealing one for Inverness Caledonian Thistle manager Scott Kellacher back at the start of the season.
Kellacher was worried about the toll the new Champions League-style format would take on his players and harboured concerns about the impact that being involved in the expanded KDM Evolution-sponsored competition would have on their bid to win the William Hill League 1 title.
He did not hold back when he was asked for his views about the changes which the SPFL had introduced at his pre-match press conference before the Highlanders’ opening fixture against Elgin City at Borough Briggs back in August.
“I think it’s ridiculous the amount of games they are expecting teams to play,” he said. “It is not ideal. But we just have to get on with it.”
Fast forward five months, though, and Kellacher has, along with many others sceptics in Scottish football, completely revised his opinion.
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Caley Thistle topped the 30 team league phase, which comprised all of the League 1 and League 2 clubs as well as 10 Premiership B teams, on goal difference in November.
The third tier leaders have subsequently made it through to the semi-final thanks to knockout round wins over Dumbarton, Partick Thistle and Stenhousemuir. They will find out who they play next following the quarter-final between St Johnstone and Ayr United at McDiarmid Park this evening.
“I have to take my words back,” said Kellacher earlier this week. “I had a go at it back at the start of the season because our schedule was just relentless. But it has actually worked out in our favour. It's been a really good cup to be involved in. I have to hold my hands up and say, ‘I got it wrong’. I'm honest enough to admit that.”
His change of heart is not just down to the success which the former Scottish Cup winners have enjoyed. He feels the KDM Evolution Trophy has been responsible for promising but raw kids across the country gaining invaluable experience of the senior game, has brought much-needed funds into the lower leagues and has given supporters huge enjoyment.
“We went on a long unbeaten run at the start of the season and it was very hard for me to change my starting line-up,” said Kellacher. “I am fortunate that I have quite a strong bench. But the Challenge Cup allowed me to give boys game time and keep them up to speed.
“We had quite a few first team players involved, but we also gave our younger boys the chance. They got the experience of playing in front of a crowd at a proper stadium. Archie Kerr, James Clark, Ben Gardiner, Sam Thompson, a good few of them, all played. These boys are just teenagers.
“We like to feel we've got a good youth academy in Inverness. We try and promote the younger lads when they are ready. Calum MacLeod is playing in the first team right now. But the Challenge Cup definitely gave a few of the boys a taste of first team football. It was brilliant for them, really beneficial.”
Kellacher continued, “You can’t underestimate how big a step up it is to play in men's football, even against League 1 and League 2 teams. But I still thought the B teams did really well against us even though we won the games. They stood up to us. We needed late goals to beat the Aberdeen B team.
“I always really enjoyed the old reserve league back in the day. Young players got the chance to play against men in front of fans in stadiums. It made you think, ‘So this is what it’s like. This is the standard I have to get to’. I thought the cup was like that in many respects. The games really mattered. As hard as it might have been, it was good for the young players.
“We have benefitted greatly bringing in young players from Premiership teams on loan and being involved against top flight B teams in the KDM Evolution Trophy also gave us the chance to see what good younger players are coming through in Scotland.
“Fair play to the sponsors as well. The prize money is very good indeed. It is a serious competition as well, not just a chance to play kids. In the knockout rounds, you have had two teams going for it. It has been great to be a part of it. The games are decided on penalties so it is exciting for supporters too.
“Our fans have enjoyed seeing us take small steps back to normality since we came out of administration. It has been a really rough few years. Fortunately for us, Alan Savage has come in and got us through it. Getting all the way to a semi-final of a cup has been great for everyone at the club, the staff, the players and the fans. Aye, I went from not convinced to a big fan, absolutely.”
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The KDM Evolution Trophy, coupled with the introduction of the SFA Cooperation System, increased Scottish youngsters’ game time by nearly 50 per cent to 71,395 minutes in the first three months of the 2025/26 campaign.
The record £1.25m prize money has also helped lower league clubs which face a constant struggle to break even in a challenging financial climate.
Teams which failed to progress beyond the league phase bank between £15,000 and £18,500. The losers in the second round, last 16, quarter-finals, semi-finals and final receive £30,000, £40,000, £50,000 and £75,000 and £100,000 respectively. The winners pocket a cool £150,000.
Stewart Petrie of Montrose – the second-longest serving manager in the SPFL after Dougie Samuel of The Spartans – was involved in the previous incarnation of the Challenge Cup both as a player and a coach. He wholeheartedly approves of the changes which have been made.
“I was a big fan of it I must say,” he said. “It was invaluable for us. It got every member of the squad games, let us play a couple of fringe players and kids. It helped us after we had lost a couple of league matches. It gave us a slightly different focus and let us to try something different. It bred confidence. I really enjoyed it.
“It was a bonus to be honest with you. If we'd been in a slightly different position in the league, we might have been able to play even more young boys because we've got some real exciting under-19s at the club just now. Hopefully, that's an avenue we can go down next season.
“The prize money is a massive thing for the football club as well. It is a huge increase from before. It was a big thing for us to make sure we got through the initial league phase because it was worth a bit of money. That was an incentive for us to do well.
“It is a long time since a club outwith the Premiership won the League Cup or the Scottish Cup. The KDM Evolution Trophy gives us a chance to get deep into a national competition. You get really excited about it because you've got a chance to compete for silverware. It's something we'll strive to do in future.”
The Premiership B teams – and Aberdeen, Celtic, Dundee, Dundee United, Hearts, Hibernian, Kilmarnock, Motherwell, Rangers and St Mirren all entered sides – finished in the bottom 10 spots in the new league phase.
That led some cynics to suggest their involvement in the competition had been an unmitigated failure and that the new format had not worked.
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Craig McLeish, the first team transition phase coach at St Mirren who led to the Paisley club to a win over League 1 Alloa Athletic and a draw with League 2 Annan Athletic, knows that nothing could be further from the truth.
“I thought it was massively beneficial for our boys,” he said. “It was excellent for our group to get exposed to adult football, to that level of competition. We don't get enough of it. Previously, it was straight knockout so you could maybe just have one game. The league phase gives you six games. Every game gave us a different challenge.
“In our own environment, we get the Under-19 League and the Under-19 Cup. You’re playing against the same boys at the same age all the time. It's all a bit familiar, a bit sterile. Playing in front of a live crowd in the KDM Evolution Trophy was invaluable to them.
“The easy thing for people to do with it is just look at the league table and say, ‘The B teams were down at the bottom of it! It’s pointless! It’s a waste of time!’ That was the lazy narrative about it. But we had schoolboys playing in it, we had 15-year-old boys playing for us.
“Playing under-17 boys is not an excuse for not going through to the knockout rounds. We felt like if we had been a bit braver and had gone in with a bit more confidence then it might have been different. But we were going into the unknown. We actually handled ourselves well. We were brilliant in some games, but maybe lacked a 90 minute performance.”
McLeish continued, “I know some people talked about how hectic the schedule was. But I only see positives from it. I'm actually really looking forward to St Mirren playing in it again next year. Our challenge has to be to go and qualify and progress. The B teams will be better prepared for it next season and will hopefully compete better as a result.
“The SPFL have been open to feedback. We drew Dumbarton in our group and we had boys who were out on cooperation loans there. They weren't allowed to play for either team. But the organisers have taken that on board and will address that next season. It is early days.
“They're trying to do things to improve football and to improve young players in this country. You're always going to get people who will criticise it. But from a personal perspective I thought it was absolutely brilliant for our boys.”
His Hearts counterpart Angus Beith concurs completely. The Tynecastle club compete in the Lowland League and are used to their boys being involved in a higher level of competition than age-group football. But their head coach felt the KDM Evolution Trophy was a step up.
Beith, whose lads beat full-time Queen of the South and Kelty Hearts in the league phase, qualified for the knockout rounds and ran Championship rivals St Johnstone close in the second round before losing 1-0, is optimistic the competition will, in tandem with the cooperation loans, help more youngsters to make the step up to the senior game in future.
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“We loved being a part of it,” he said. “We've obviously had exposure to the men’s game in the Lowland League in the last four seasons and that has been great for us as a club.
“But I felt the Challenge Cup ramped it up an extra level. The fact that we had six games against high quality opposition was really exciting for the players. But there was lots of learning from it too. There was definitely a step up
“It's added to the opportunities the boys have had this season. All those experiences are improving them as players and giving them that belief that they can take the next step in their careers.
“That is a big one at our club given how well the first team are doing. With the introduction of Jamestown, the players who are coming in are at a high level.
“But being a part of a men's environment where the consequences for mistakes are much, much higher is very much at the heart of what we're doing. It's a completely different feeling. Mistakes get elevated tenfold.
“The quicker they get exposed to that the better as far as I’m concerned. Hopefully the cooperation agreements and the KDM Evolution Trophy accelerates their development.”
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