COVE PLAYERS WORTHY OF ONE CHANCE
BY SCOTT BURNS
COVE RANGERS will return for pre-season this weekend and Paul Hartley is just delighted it is for a crack at League One.
The League Two champs will Covid-19 test their players twice a week, like the Premiership clubs, to allow the squad back.
Hartley is just relieved after a summer of uncertainty as Hearts and Partick Thistle launched a failed legal bid to stop their relegations and block the promotions of the three lower-league champions.
Hartley said: “It has been strange and not the most enjoyable of summers.
“We had such a good season up to March and then it was all change.
“We were crowned champions and then there was everything else that happened after that with the legal case.
“We didn’t know what league we would be in, everything was out with our control. We just had to wait and see. We would have been prepared for whatever league we were asked to play in.
“I am just delighted it is League One because the boys had such a good season last year and they deserve their promotion.
“It is going to be a tough challenge with top teams like Partick Thistle, Falkirk and Airdrie, etc but it’s also an exciting one that we are all looking forward to.”
Cove were crowned champions in April but that was during the lockdown and because of the restrictions and furlough Hartley’s men have been unable to meet up, never mind celebrate their success.
“We just want to get back to some sort of normality and we have a bit of that with the Premiership returning,” Hartley said.
“Just to be back seeing the players again will be great. I haven’t seen them since March.
“They want to get back playing, seeing their mates and working hard in training.
“The good thing is we’re now set to come back and we are back before a lot of clubs. If all bodes well we should start training on Saturday.”
Hartley has already added to his squad with the arrival of striker Leighton McIntosh, a player he knows well from his time as Dundee boss.
He said: “He is a good, experienced boy at this level. He was a young boy at Dundee when I was there and he has a good, good goalscoring record.
“He comes back up the road after a good spell with Wrexham but he has done well at Arbroath, Peterhead and Airdrie.”