Caledonian Braves boss Ricky Waddell was delighted to see his side fire six past Newton Stewart to progress in the Scottish Cup.
Waddell wanted to make sure his Lowland League outfit didn’t just scrape past their South of Scotland League opponents, and had misgivings when Rory Drysdale gave them an eighth-minute lead.
But a Ross McNeill hat-trick and strikes by Jamie Walker, Jack McDowell and Luke Main saw Braves through to a second round clash at East Kilbride next month.
Waddell said: “Newton Stewart scored first, but in terms of us coming out of the traps, which I wanted our boys to do, they did that.
“But we lost a set-play goal, a bit of scrappy goal, we didn’t deal with it, it goes in, and it put them in a situation where they got a little bit of momentum and confidence from that.
“But if you look at the game as a whole, from the first minute we were well ahead, with our players and quality, and we just needed to find the net.
“When we did find the net it settled us down a wee bit, and I changed it a little bit tactically in the second half.
“I felt that we just needed to go to 2-1 and we started to calm down with possession, not rush things, and we were really good after that.
“We knocked the ball about well, we were really clinical in front of goal after that, which was really pleasing for me.
“I didn’t want to scrape by 2-1 or that type of thing, I wanted it to be as emphatic as possible once we got to a 2-1 or 3-1 and score as many goals as possible, to get the confidence as high as possible for our guys.”
Waddell would prefer Braves to have got an opponent that isn’t from the same league, but says they’ll get on with it and prepare for their trip to K-Park on October 22.
He said: “This cup competition gives you an opportunity and it’s up to us to take it.
“East Kilbride is a decent draw – of course they’re probably thinking the same thing.
“I would have liked someone not in our league, because we play East Kilbride a couple of times, if I’m being totally honest.
“But it is what it is, we’ll get on with it, prepare properly, and we play East Kilbride on October 1 in the league, so I’m sure we’ll know each other pretty well by the time the Scottish Cup game comes.
“We’ve got to go and perform, be ready for that, and our aim is obviously to get into the next round again.”
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