Dark Blues boss has faith in youngsters

DUNDEE BOSS John Brown insists he has no qualms about relying on his young players when the competitive season gets under way on Saturday.

The Dark Blues will head to Recreation Park for this weekend’s Ramsdens Cup tie to take on an Alloa side fresh from successive league promotions and an away trip against a fellow First Division team full of confidence perhaps makes a fixture against the Wasps one that teams may have wished to avoid.

However, Dundee have been boosted by an impressive pre-season so far and will head to face Paul Hartley’s men in good spirits.

Brown has already revealed he plans to use several of his younger squad members in the Ramsdens Cup but fully believes they are more than capable of stepping up to the plate.

“The first competitive game is in the Ramsdens Cup against a team who have won back to back promotions so I think we’ll find out a lot about the kids in that game,” he said.

“But you’ve got to have faith in the youngsters.

“There will be a sprinkling of experience but there will be a good six or seven younger boys who will play in the Ramsdens Cup game.

“We did that in the under 20 league at the end of the season, when we gave the school kids an opportunity but we put a wee bit of experience in there as well.

“The likes of Matty Lockwood, Declan Gallagher, Carl Finnigan, they all helped the young kids, so we’ll do the same for the Ramsdens.

“I’ll be using that tie to blood some of the young boys.”

Recreation Park’s plastic pitch has prompted concerns from some players in the past but Brown reckons that shouldn’t come into the equation.

“We’ve had three or four games on plastic so that will give us a feel for it,” he said.

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Picture: SNS. Young defender Declan Gallagher.