It’s cup action for the fourth consecutive week for The Buffs as they welcome Cumbernauld Colts to Buffs Park in Round 3 of the South Region Challenge Cup. The Buffs squad should be well rested after last week’s postponement and will need to be at their best to get a result against the Lowland League side today.
Founded originally as a youth team in 1969, ‘The Colts’ quickly became well recognised in Scottish youth football before rebranding in 1999. Scottish internationals, Jackie McNamara and Derek Whyte, both spent time with the Colts in their younger years before going on to play a combined total of 45 times for the national side. Today’s visitors only entered the Lowland League in 2015 after previously playing in the amateur scene for most of the club’s life, winning one major trophy since joining the pyramid.
Despite recording the joint highest league position in the club’s history last season, of 4th, The Colts have struggled in the early stages of this campaign, picking up 14 points from their opening 12 league fixtures, a record which leaves them in 13th place in the division. Cumbernauld Colts were defeated 2-0 on their travels to Tranent last week, with the result putting an end to a 3-game win streak which The Colts had recently found themselves on. It’s the first ever competitive match between the sides, with the last, and only, contest between the clubs coming in a friendly back in the summer of 2023, which The Colts won 1-0. Colts are managed by former Cumnock Manager John Doyle and he is assisted by former Buffs Manager David Gormley. Ex-Buffs goalkeeper loanee, Harry Broun, signed for the Broadwood side in the Summer and has featured regularly between the sticks so far this season. Attacking midfielder, Josh Jack is the Colts’ top scorer for the season, netting 5 goals in 15 games across all competitions this year after joining from Cumnock Juniors in June.
The Buffs have only been beaten once out of five cup games this season, with the loss coming in the most important of them all when we visited Clachnacuddin just a fortnight ago. Kevin Kelly’s side have faced and beaten both Wigtown & Bladnoch, and Dunipace in the competition so far, and will be hoping they can add Cumbernauld Colts to that list as they look to get their name in the hat for the draw of the 4th round. Olly Smith is 3rd joint top scorer in the cup so far after getting a hat trick down in Wigtown before grabbing another against Dunipace in the previous round.
Kevin Kelly will be looking for his side to get a win tomorrow as they attempt to build some momentum heading into a crucial part of the season with two massive league games against struggling St Cadocs and Beith coming up soon.
