Reaction

The Wasps progressed to the next round of this seasons League Cup after defeating local rivals Stirling Albion 1-0 thanks to a Greig Spence first half strike, his fourth goal in two games since rejoining the club. The miserable weather, holiday season and admission price saw only 684 spectators at Recreation Park for this early awaited “Local derby”. Barry Smith’s side took the lead in the 26th minute when Greig Spence latched on to a half chance and rounded the Stirling Albion before slotting in his first goal for “The Wasps” against Stirling Albion. The home should have increased their lead before half-time but after having plenty of possession could not add to the scoreline. The closest visitors Stirling Albion came to an equaliser came late in the game from ex Wasp, Willie Robertson, who cracked a shot from 25 yards narrowly over the crossbar. The job had been done, by progressing to the next round of the competion which in cup games is always objective.

barry smith after league cup progression

The cup games are about getting into the next round, I thought in the first half we did very well and had good chances, we could maybe have scored one or two more, and in the second half I thought Stirling Albion did extremely well, we were disappointed with our second half but overall I think we deserved to go through. The conditions were poor but they were the same for both teams so I don’t think that comes into it, we should be good enough to take care of the game.

We had a lot of possession of the ball, but we never did enough with it in the second half, in the first half we were far more productive. Greig Spence has brought goals to the team, he only needs that wee half chance and he can score goals, we are happy with that, on another day he would maybe have got another one but he scored the important goal to get us through to the next round. Today’s game was a tough game, Stirling Albion have good forward players who were hard to deal with, credit to Stirling for playing the way they did in the second half. The most important thing is that we are in the next round, we are in the hat and will take whoever comes out.

It is never easy going to Palmerston Park, Jim McIntyre had them playing really good stuff at the end of last season – they had very few defeats from January, 2014 through to May, 2014 we will need to be at our best for the whole of the ninety minutes to make sure that we come away with something from our opening league fixture.