Dalbeattie Star boss Ritchie Maxwell is hoping the fans turn out for Monday’s local derby.
Star kick-off 2022 at Raydale where they take on Gretna 2008, the only other Dumfries and Galloway side in the Lowland League.
Maxwell said: “It’s always good we have derbies at this time of year. We’ve moved the game to a day when there is not a lot of football on and there are new restrictions on crowds at SPFL games.
“Hopefully people who would potentially go to other games and can’t due to the rules will go to a local game and we’ll see a good turnout.
“We planned to give the boys Christmas time off and be back for a session before the new year ahead of the game.”
Monday will be Star’s first game for more than a fortnight.
Their clash with Berwick Rangers on December 18 was called off as the Islecroft pitch was frozen.
And their bid to bring their Boxing Day fixture with Stirling University forward to December 22 was thwarted when the floodlights failed at Forthbank.
Maxwell said: “They had failed the night before for the Stirling Albion game but once they’d got them working they’d stayed on for the complete match.
“When we arrived they had tried them once but when they put all the floodlights on, all the lights in the ground went off. When we arrived they had put two on and were waiting to put the others on.
“They came on during the warm up and were fine for 20 minutes, then everything went off.
“We gave it one more chance but as soon as they put the second two on again the same thing happened. That was when the decision was made and the referee had already said if the lights go off during the game it would be abandoned due to the time the process takes.
“I feel a wee bit for Stirling Uni as it’s not their ground. Ideally they could have checked them during the day on Wednesday before we started to travel, that’s probably the only thing they could have done to avoid it. It’s not their fault it was postponed.
“We had boys with knocks who couldn’t have played so hopefully the break will do them good.”
