Scottish Cup - 6/7/8 January

[Beanie]

I could be tempted on the handicaps on Gretna - might be asking a lot of them to get a win given that St J have only lost once at home in 12, but the 6 draws at McDiarmud, including v Dundee at the weekend, is perhaps the more telling stat. Gretna unbeaten away from home in the second, and I think they could well take this one to a replay.

Hibs into 1.12 Doubt I'll bother with them now, unless its a handicap flutter.

7.50 on Airdrie United(or perhaps more on Betfair) could be worth a small bet - as I say Dunfermline didn't look that good v Falkirk and the home side really should have taken the points.

I like Para's shout on Motherwell too and will do a bit more looking into that one tonight.

[Beanie]

Livingston have completed the signing of Republic of Ireland Under-21 midfielder Wes Hoolahan from Shelbourne for a fee of about £100,000.
The 22-year-old has signed a two-and-a-half year contract.

Livi player-boss Paul Lambert believes that he has captured one of the most exciting players in the Irish League.

"We watched him several times before the end of the Irish season and he lived up to all we had heard about him," Lambert told his club website.

"He is an exciting player and will bring us width and more attacking options.

"Wes will bring additional quality to a side that works hard and plays as a team, which is vital as we enter the second half of the season."

Lambert is anxious to improve his squad, currently struggling in the Scottish Premier League relegation zone.

Hoolahan played 29 times for Shelbourne last season, including Champions League qualifiers, scoring four goals.

And Shelbourne manager Pat Fenlon said: "He's not a player we want to lose, but Wes would have no problems coping with Scottish football. He is very skilful."

He is eligible for Saturday, but probably not match fit so its doubtful he will feature.

[Beanie]

Hamilton Accies have completed the signing of Spanish striker Rudy Torres for a five-figure fee from Welsh Premier League side Llanelli.
And 35-year-old midfielder Scott MacKenzie, who had been on loan, has signed on permanently after being released by Falkirk.

The 21-year-old Torres will make his debut in Monday's Division One derby at home to Airdrie United.

He was previously with Fuengirola, UD San Pedro and Malaga's B team.

Torres has signed until the end of next season.

Meanwhile, young local defender Paul McMullan has signed professional forms for Accies until the end of the season after being on an amateur form since October.

Defender Kevin Nicoll has returned from his loan spell with Stenhousemuir, but Accies say that the 19-year-old is likely to move on during the transfer window.

From www.bbc.co.uk

[natrass]

Its all a bit bleak in the English and Scottish Cups isnt it? Absolutely nothing jumped out so I looked a bit closer and still nowt. A betting wasteland.

I might just oppose the RFO in everything for a laugh ... that has to pay.

[MickeyPaul]

I actually believe Gretna are well capable of a win but the odds aren't tempting me. I don't really have any clear thoughts on much on the moment and am thinking about double chance and goal bets. Oh, I'd be willing to have a go with Motherwell @ 2.20 gamebookers though. Definitely.

[kompressaur]

I'm with natrass and others that i cant even scrape a bet together this weekend. I cant take Gretna nor Motherwell with any confidence. As mentioned Alloa went to St Johnstone mind last year and beat them well enough. Dif side now tho. I aint up on Motherwell away from home but St Mirren dont let in many. Again it could be tight. I prefer Motherwell but i still aint sure i could trust them with too much of my cash.

Corals go 11/10 on QP, right that could be one. Livvy/Livvy at 4/5 with stan James would be one i could take if i could get on. There's still no denying the fact that Alloa are shipping goals and i suppose the young irish signing waiting to get into the side could encourage one or two other strikers to put in a performance.

Ive a wee feeling about Ayr so i'm gonna take them in a wee single. 33/1 also ht/ft in Ladbrokes. Just got a cup upset written on it to me. Maybe iam still influenced to the old battles between these two 5 or 6 years ago. Ayr 10/3 to score first

Dundee i still expect to win though i could understand folks views on the draw. Theyre home performances have been better. Suppose need to know if Lynch is back and the other forward

[Mr Chips]

If I could get matched at 3.0 on ABERDEEN at Betfair Id take them to beat Dundee United.

United are without
1.Central Defender Paul Ritchie for this one who is suspended.
2. Lee Miller still out injured too.
3. Possibly Colin Samuel who was injured against Rangers
4. Speculation surrounding Mark Wilson too with a 500k tag being placed on him... I hgave heard he will be sold in January as there is no more money from Eddie Thompson to fund signings.

Was at Pittodrie on Saturday and was encouraged by 2nd half perfromance.

[Beanie]

Good to see you about chips

Bit of a gloomy thread thus far in't it?

Calls for an evening of hard work methinks

Lets start with:

6 Jan-19:45 Dunfermline v Airdrie Utd 1.50 3.75 5.50

With a semi final place in the League Cup to look forward to in a couple of weeks, a busy month kicks off with the third round of the Scottish Cup.

Airdrie United are the guests, in a tie that is officially the first meeting between the sides. Whatever the history and the politics of the new club, Dunfermline Athletic have never faced Airdrie United in their current guise before. Numerous meetings took place between ourselves and Clydebank, whose place Airdrie United bought in the Scottish Football League in 2002.

Airdrieonians were of course defunct at that point, having finally had the books closed on them and having the uneviable record of being the first Scottish league club to fold since Third Lanark way back in 1967. A new club rose from the Airdrieonians ashes, and Clydebank`s registration was taken over by the new Airdrie United, a new Scottish football club was formed.

Second division champions in 2003/04 season, Airdrie United have moved steadily into consolidating their current first division spot.

Sitting in sixth place in the first division, they are safely away from the relegation and play off positions currently taken up by the detached Brechin City and Queen of the South. Those two teams look as if they are already fighting it out to avoid the one automatic relegation spot.

Meanwhile, Airdrie are in the comfort zone where they are not going to go down, but not threaten the league leaders either.

As a mark of their current progress, they are sitting one place and one point above Dundee in the league, though their fall from SPL grace has been a remarkable one this season.

A fine start to the season has since seen Airdrie United become very inconsistent in terms of results. Their home form has remained solid with six wins from ten, though they don`t have their problems to seek on the road.

An away defeat to near neighbours Hamilton Accies on Sunday was their fifth away defeat, up against only two wins away from Airdrie this season. Both their away wins have been at Dens Park this season, and we all know how easy it is to win there.......

An anti climactic 2-0 defeat to Raith Rovers at Starks Park in the first round of the League Cup ended their interest in that competition early, and they will no doubt be looking to avoid a similar early exit from the Scottish Cup in Fife too.

Dunfermline go into the match as rare favourites. Poor home form this season took an upturn with the Boxing Day 3-3 draw with Rangers. Other than the 2-1 win over Dundee United earlier this season, every other league game has resulted in an away win.

There has also been the highlight of the 3-0 win over Hibs in the League cup, hopefully such form in one off ties will continue on Saturday. That`s SATURDAY to clear up the bizarre situation that has been created by the media. For some reason, the BBC and numerous teletext and newspaper outlets have listed the game as taking place on Sunday afternoon at three o`clock. This was never the case!

Dunfermline have few new injury worries coming into the game, a rarity in itself. Yannick Zambernardi, Simon Donnelly and Scott Morrison are now the only first team players missing from action.

Lee Makel returns from his one match suspension, and could therefore force one change with the newly re-signed Jamie McCunnie perhaps dropping out to make way for him.

Whatever line up takes to the field, the Scottish Cup has provided generations of Dunfermline fans with some amazing memories over the years. The road to Hampden (part II for this season alone) starts on Saturday and a support similar to that displayed at Falkirk last weekend would help the team go further in the competition.

Come on Ye Pars!

From www.dafc.net - check out the forums there too

Last season Airdrie lost in Round 3 v Ross County(4:1 in Dingwall ) while Dunfermline laboured past East Fife before going down to Celtic.

Like most teams at the wrong end of their division, Dunfermline don't make good favourites, so you'll be hard pushed to want to invest in them, but likewise, and Airdrie team with a record of 2-5-5 away doesn't inspire too much confidence.

Not much appeals then, but if Makel returns a Dunfermline side which has a little more confidence now should do the business.

[Beanie]

7 Jan-15:00 Alloa v Livingston 8.50 5.00 1.25

No doubt Alloa are poor this season, but Livingston have scored just 4 goals in 10 away games this season.

Nevertheless, just try taking your eyes off Alloas form...I make it 10 defeats and a draw in the last 11

Yuck.

7 Jan-13:00 Spartans v Queens Park 3.10 3.60 1.90

Very tricky one to judge - Spartans recently beat Preston Athletic 2-0 but haven't played many games in the East of Scotland League this season so far, and of the ones they have its a mixed record. As I mentioned City Park is a tough place to play, and Spartans seemed to fully deserve their win v Berwick, and cuffed Lossiemouth too.

Division Three leaders Berwick Rangers crashed out of the Tennents Scottish Cup at the first hurdle.
Donal Henretty grabbed the only goal of the game in the 61st minute, stabbed in from a fine Craig Smart cross.

Willie Bennett had twice come close as Spartans made most of the running in the first half.

The second half followed much the same pattern and though Berwick's Kevin Gordon hit the post in stoppage time, the offside flag was already up.

However - maybe one result we can look to here is when Queens Park travelled to East Stirling recently - another occasion where the Glasgow side were big favourites at odds on, and they duly did the business 4-0.

Queen's Park enhanced their play-off credentials with an emphatic win over bottom-of-the table East Stirling.
The visitors went ahead on eight minutes when Bryan Felvus pressurised home defender Stephen Oates into turning the ball into his own net.

The visitors doubled their lead after Steve Reilly converted a penalty.

Eight minutes after the break Felvus raced clear to score with a fine drive, with Mark Ferry beating the offside trap to score the visitors' fourth.

Needs more thought really.

[Beanie]

7 Jan-15:00 Dundee Utd v Aberdeen 2.30 3.20 2.70

I'm agreeing with you Chips on this one - its all about securing a decent price on Aberdeen if any bet is to be worthwhile on this one.

One thing to note is that in the last 12 games at Tannadice, Dundee United have won just 2 - and this team just now(and over the last season) is one of the poorest United teams in a long while(although Aberdeen ain't too hot either.)

Both seemed to enjoy slight improvements at the weekend, and I leave this alone for now.

7 Jan-15:00 Falkirk v Brechin 1.25 5.00 8.50

5 goals, 2 points and no wins in 11 away games for Brechin. 8 goals, 3 points, and no wins in 11 games at home for Falkirk.

This is a bloody nightmare isn't it?

Falkirk played well v Dunfermline, but thats a bit of a short price on them - 1.27 is the best around and unless 1.33 or so materialises on Betfair I can't see much point in taking them.

[Beanie]

This isn't going too well...

7 Jan-15:00 Hearts v Kilmarnock 1.50 3.50 6.00

1.62 available on Hearts and I think for me that looks like too high a price. As Parahandy mentioned 1.50 was probably fair but thats now too much.

Over the last 10 games at Tynecastle, Hearts have beaten Killie 8 times, and Hearts have won both meetings this season and the last 4.

Killie of course are still proving there is life after Chris Boyd, but they have needed late goals to do it with last minute winners v Falkirk(away) and Dundee United at home, neither of which is playing well right now, and a decent 2-2 draw with Hibs.

However, Hearts look to have finally sorted themselves out, and stuffed Falkirk before playing well v Celtic. They look a bit more like they did when Burley was in charge, and I'll be on that 1.62 before the night is out.



7 Jan-15:00 Hibernian v Arbroath 1.14 6.50 12.00

The 1.14 is now gone and just 1.12 remains - which might just put me off now.

However, covering perhaps 2-0, 3-0 and 4-0 might just be worth a second look and you'll get well over evens on it too.

As mentioned Arbroath are a very poor away side, while Hibs have a tendency of being quite ruthless vs lower Division sides in the Scottish Cup. Last season their results were:

2:0 v Dundee(not lower Divisio, but they might aswell have been at the time )
4:0 v Brechin
2:0 v St Mirren

Their defence isn't rock solid but Arbroath shouldn't test it out too much, and i'd call it perhaps as a just above evens shot for Hibs to get one of the above scorelines.

[kompressaur]

i like to see the Aberdeen confidence Beanie and i'll be with you guys. Queens Park whilst not taing chances should have more of a goal threat than Berwick had that day. With Harvey and Felvus and Sincliar all playing and them relatively back to full strength i can see them doing the bisiness.(??) but i wont be going to large on it. I quite like them in cups and liked the way they dealt with Raith rovers.

[Beanie]

Confidence? I'm not sure for now so will wait for more team news and such.

Confidence in the Hearts bet though

7 Jan-15:00 Inverness CT v Ayr 1.28 4.50 8.50

The 1.28 is a distant memory and just 1.25 remains as the best price on ICT. Part of a fun wee accumulator is about as far as I can see this one going, but the way ICT are playing they should make some short work of Ayr.

7 Jan-15:00 Queen of South v Hamilton 4.33 3.75 1.61

Bah...this is lower league nonsense isn't it?

As bad as QOS are, they have only been beaten by more than a goal at home on 1 occasion this season (3:1) v St Johnstone, but all that said they are still getting beaten and have scored 1 goal in 5 games.

Hamilton are the second best away side in the division, and 1.73 seems fair here, even perhaps a little generous from totalbet.

[kompressaur]

still got the 3 Div 3 games too. Forgot about them. They are almost forgetable to me. Lemme look. Montrose drew at Berwick in the middle of Berwick's good run.

Reading the report on http://soccernet.espn.go.com/report?id=186975&cc=5739

Berwick's winning run came to an end but they escaped with a 1-1 draw after Montrose's Gregg Henslee squandered three opportunities to win the game.
Rangers faded right out of the contest after they had taken the lead on 54 minutes through Kevin Little's header, which came after Kevin McLeish saw his penalty saved by Montrose goalkeeper Andrew Reid.


From then on Montrose took control as Berwick lost their rhythm and ran out of steam.


Craig Coyle made a wonder save from a Stevie Kerrigan header before Kevin Webster silenced the home supporters by turning quickly inside the box and equalising with a low shot.


Despite being presented three clear chances to complete the turnaround, Henslee missed the target each time to spare Rangers.

mmmmmm Berwick havent scored in 5 and seem to be missing the players they have out

Scottish Division 3 Arbroath 4-0 Berwick 12-11-2005
Scottish FA Cup Spartans 1-0 Berwick 26-11-2005
Scottish Division 3 Berwick 0-2 Stenh'semuir 03-12-2005
Scottish Division 3 Berwick 0-1 Albion 10-12-2005
Scottish Division 3 East Fife 1-0 Berwick 26-12-2005

Montrose new manager,at home, prone to let me down, hard to predict, berwick ok on the road, playing ok but just cant score. I dunno. Tough really but i'd be interested in the team news etc

East fife look far too short even with their 2nd best home record in the league behind Stenhousemuir. Elgin unbeaten in their last 4. Smart should be back for EF and the fans are still on the managers back due to tactics and there was talk a while back of dressing room disputes etc. I just couldnt get involved. Looks a bit 2-1 either way. Looks like shite actually. I cant bet on this.

East Fife made it five wins from their last six games with a hard-fought 2-1 victory at Elgin.


Craig Smart fired them into a seventh-minute lead with a superb 25-yard effort and four minutes into the second half John Bradford made it 2-0 from close range.


Elgin rallied and gave themselves hope when Martin Johnston pulled a goal back with a neat finish after 56 minutes, before the home side piled on the pressure and Garry Wood twice went close to an equaliser.


East Fife goalkeeper John Dodds emerged as the visitors' hero in the dying minutes when he brilliantly denied Johnston a leveller, leaving Elgin still seeking their first home win of the season.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/report?id=186976&cc=5739

I'd need to read up on albion's poor home record and East Stirling's current squad but i still think Albion could be a bit short. I dunno. East Stirling dont have Diak now but it always seems a bit of a dodgy fixture to me. Lemme see the h2h's

They were unbeaten in 15 to East Strling
http://www.albionrovers.com/05-06/es1-10report.htm

You think they could possibly wanna get a bit of revenge for that game where their manager locked them out the dressing room in annoyance for 10 minutes at half time?

Was reading this about ayr. Gretna looking bette to me too poss.
http://www.ayrunitedfc.co.uk/index.a...t&matchid=4328

[kompressaur]

Kerigan and Webster could be out for Montrose though. I fancy a wee upset at ICT Beanie. I like ayr and i like them beating ICT

Inverness Caledonian Thisle Ayr United 7:3 Sat 02-12-2000

i had just met the ex and was lying in bed with her showing her my hobby of backing British football. C5 had great teletext live score then offering 3 scores up on screen at a time. Ayr were 3-0 up at Ht and i was loving it. Them days depress me now. Feel awfully familiar mind. Go on the Ayr