Last Scottish Premiership colts game of season next up for Gala Fairydean Rovers

Saturday gone’s 2-0 loss to East Stirlingshire at home at Netherdale in Galashiels was Rovers’ second defeat in a row by that scoreline, having suffered the same result hosting Tranent Juniors four days previously.

It continues a losing run begun by the Borderers’ 4-1 defeat away to Rangers B in Dumbarton on Saturday, February 4, but the prospect of facing off against further Scottish Premiership colts isn’t one that concerns Rover midfielder Danny Galbraith.

Gala’s record against the Scottish Lowland Football League’s top-flight under-21s teams this campaign, with only one left to play, comprises two wins, two losses and a draw and Galbraith is hoping his team can take their points tally against them into double figures this coming Saturday at Rosewell’s Ferguson Park, with kick-off at 3pm.

“I’m definitely looking forward to that one,” said the 32-year-old.

“We always seem to do well against the colts sides. Even against Rangers B a couple of Saturdays ago, we played reasonably well despite losing.

“The colts teams like to play a very similar style of football to us in terms of getting the ball down and playing, so I never worry about us going into games like that.

“It’s two teams that are going to have a football match and, on our day, we can give anybody in the league a game.”

Player-manager Martin Scott’s Rovers side, held to a 3-3 draw in the reverse fixture versus Hearts B at Netherdale in mid-October, go into this weekend’s trip to Midlothian sitting 11th in the table, with 39 points from 29 fixtures. That’s two league places and four points better off than their hosts but the Edinburgh youngsters, having drawn 1-1 at the city’s Civil Service Strollers at the weekend, have got two games in hand on them.

Galbraith, forced to go off injured early in the second half against manager Sandy Clark’s East Stirlingshire outfit on Saturday, added: “Any time you lose a game, you need to go and try to stop that run as quickly as possible and that means going into the next game with the intention of picking up three points, and that’ll certainly be our mindset heading into Saturday.”

Saturday’s game was swung in the visitors’ favour by a controversial 71st-minute penalty claimed by home players and fans to have been given for a foul committed just outside the area.

Connor Greene scored from the spot to put Shire ahead and Scott Honeyman added another four minutes later to make it 2-0 for back-to-back wins lifting the Falkirk team up to 15th place in the table.

Rovers now know who they’ll be up against in this year’s East of Scotland Cup final, namely Linlithgow Rose.

The East of Scotland Football League premier division table-toppers beat League 1’s FC Edinburgh 3-1 in their semi-final last week to book their place in the final, to be played on a date yet to be fixed.

3-1 was also the scoreline that Rose beat Gala by in the East of Scotland Qualifying Cup final last May, securing both sides semi-final places in the cup they’re now set to contest, Rovers having knocked out League 1’s Kelty Hearts in theirs in January to progress.

Their rematch with Rose will only be the Borderers’ second cup final since their creation in 2013 by reuniting Gala Fairydean and Gala Rovers, the former’s last one having been back in 2002 and the latter’s at the double in 2013, winning both.