Mackay admits weekend off can help to ease injury list

Dave Mackay believes Stirling Albion sitting idle this weekend will give his crocked stars time to rest up for an important clash against Queen’s Park next Saturday.

The Binos boss is hoping to be able to call on a full squad when the Spiders come calling next weekend, with his side without a game tomorrow as the second round of the IRN-BRU Cup gets underway.

Alloa dumped Stirling out in the previous round and Mackay is happy to let his side rest up despite their impressive win over Elgin City last Saturday.

Goals from Cammy Thomson, Peter MacDonald and Jordan Allan saw Albion end their long wait for a win in League Two — and now the next target is to arrest their dreadful home form, which has seen them fail to triumph at Forthbank since beating Clyde 2-1 on February 24.

However, Mackay is hoping having a full squad to pick from will boost his side’s chances of sinking the Spiders.

“We need to improve our home form because it’s not been good enough since I came to the club — and probably even before that,” admitted the Binos manager. “Elgin was a really good performance but we can’t get carried away — it was only one win and we are not where we want to be at this stage of the season. “Hopefully the break will mean that by the time the Queen’s Park game comes round, we will have pretty much a full squad to choose from.

“Darren Barr (below) had to pull out just before the match on Saturday because of his knee and he was feeling better on Tuesday, albeit he didn’t train.

“Mark Stewart has got the green light to get back to training and Jason Marr and Kevin Moon aren’t far away either.

“Darren Smith was still struggling a bit with his back so we need to wait and see with him.”

The comprehensive win in Elgin has kick-started Stirling’s season and Mackay admits the result has lifted morale in the camp.

Now he’s calling on the players to maintain that level of performance and make it hard for him to change the team.

“I watched the Elgin game back again in full and the performance was even better than I thought at the time,” said Mackay.

“I’ve always said to the players that their job is to make it difficult for me to drop them and they were excellent against Elgin.

“It was a happier place at training on Tuesday because it’s never easy when you are on a bad run.

“We also had a closed-door friendly against Brechin to keep us ticking over.

●Stirling Albion play their second Reserve League 2 fixture on Tuesday, September 11, when they take on Livingston at the Tony Macaroni Arena, kick-off 8pm.