Alba cup final: Longmuir sure SFL showpiece can capitalise on referee chaos

Whatever the many drawbacks of this week's furore involving referees, it at least ensured thoughts of the Alba Challenge Cup final were prominent in plenty minds. After all, the very question of whether or not tomorrow's game at McDiarmid Park could take place proved a crucial talking point as Scotland's officials pressed ahead with their withdrawal of labour.

Winter conditions could yet intervene at what has regressed into a troublesome playing surface in Perth. Nonetheless, the players and officials of Ross County and Queen of the South are pressing ahead with their plans for what is regarded a key date in the Scottish Football League calendar.

David Longmuir, the SFL's chief executive, was only fully content yesterday that the match in Perth would go ahead, with Maltese officials in place. "Thankfully the referee will have two easy clubs to referee," Longmuir said. "They are both friendly clubs, who won't cause him any hassle. It was important to us that the match went on in its original slot. But we would rather it was going ahead after a full SFL card on Saturday. The final has been tinged a bit by the loss of the league fixtures.

"Our clubs are angry about that, angry that they were marginalised. I think we dealt with the situation very well, you can only use the set of cards you are dealt and with us we lost an entire set of (Polish] referees."

As a "duty of care" in Longmuir's words, SFL clubs missing out on games this weekend have been handed a 10,000 advance on an annual winter payment from the league.

The SFL have added cause to value their retaining of their showpiece occasion. With Scottish football in general suffering from an inability to attract meaningful sponsorship, BBC Alba's ongoing willingness to sustain the Challenge Cup is valuable. The efforts of Longmuir and his team to ensure the final will go ahead, despite totally unforeseen circumstances, should surely be in the SFL's favour going forward.

The identity of the two teams who will contest this final is hardly anywhere near as surprising as that of the referee who will preside over the tie. Both County and Queens have made headlines on account of cup exploits in recent seasons, with Hampden final appearances for them both an illustration of knock-out ability.

Of the two, though, County are the more eye-catching simply because of circumstances. If it is rare for a manager to depart a club for an assistant's post elsewhere, a move performed by Derek Adams in leaving Victoria Park for Hibernian, it is even more unusual for a coach's first match in charge to be a cup final.

Willie McStay has been afforded exactly that; either a luxury or an opportunity for mass early disappointment when he steps into the County dug-out for the first time tomorrow."We are hoping the managerial change generates a bit of extra interest that maybe wasn't there a couple of weeks ago," Longmuir added. "I'd hope for a crowd in excess of 5,000."

Adams's departure has left two key and unanswered questions. His father, George, retains an influential position at County whilst Craig Brewster, the assistant manager, remains in post for now.

The Dingwall club hope to hold onto Brewster's services and will hold talks with him next week. The former Dundee United striker must balance disappointment at not being handed an extended period to prove or otherwise that he could step back into management with an apparent lack of alternatives elsewhere in the game. Queens have recovered from their own off-field turmoil, albeit earlier in the season. Their manager Kenny Brannigan - never one to be regarded as a shrinking violet, of course - castigated the club's board of directors after financial restraints left him struggling to field a team in a league game against Dundee.

Three months on, the Dumfries men sit comfortably in mid-table in the First Division. Brannigan could even leave experienced performers such as Allan Johnston and David Weatherston on the bench for last weekend's win over Cowdenbeath. Colin McMenamin, ironically a victim of Dundee's collapse, has been recruited as a recent free transfer.

For Longmuir, a repeat of Dundee's thrilling 3-2 victory over Inverness a year ago, at the same venue, would do just nicely this time around. "That was a brilliant final, Dundee coming from 2-0 down at half-time to lift the cup," he said. "The game generated a great atmosphere and we would look for the same this year. Both teams have experience of having a cup final day out at Hampden in the last two years and we want them to recreate that, the feeling of a real sense of cup final occasion. And remember, you can't win the quadruple without lifting the Challenge Cup."

After a week of trauma, Longmuir was perfectly entitled to that quip.