Dalbeattie Star’s Scottish Cup dream is over after they were thrashed by West of Scotland champions Darvel on Saturday.
The Ayrshire side ran out 7-1 winners at Islecroft against the team currently bottom of the Lowland League.
Star boss Eddie Warwick said: “We were outclassed by a team with far bigger resources than us. I think they’re a mid-table League Two team and they’re playing a side where the manager has only been in three and a half weeks, is struggling for form and it’s a difficult time of year to add to the squad.
“Darvel got to the third or fourth round of the cup last year and I think it was a mismatch.
“We did get to 1-1 although only for a minute or so. At 3-1 at half-time we thought it wasn’t too bad. I thought some of their play was excellent and some of the stats posted in 11 games are ridiculous.
“It was 4-1 at 80 minutes and 7-1 at 90 so maybe boys were getting tired from not having the ball and running all the time. We need to make sure it doesn’t happen again. We can’t just fold like that, we need to take our medicine.
“Folk need to be sensible in respect of where Darvel are and where we are right now. The board are realistic, they knew it was a free hit with a tough draw and you could see the gulf in class between the two teams.
“They have guys who have three or four hundred games in league football up against guys with no league experience.”
Willie Robertson gave Darvel an early lead but it was cancelled out by Steven Degnan.
Chris McGowan soon restored the visitors’ advantage with Daryll Meggatt adding the third before the break.
Allan MacKenzie got the fourth before the hour mark with the goals flowing in the last 10 minute, MacKenzie scoring twice more to complete his hat-trick before Lewis Morrison rounded things off. Star’s focus returns to the league this weekend as they try to ensure they stay in the Lowland League.
On Saturday they host Tranent before a tricky midweek game against Heart of Midlothian’s youngsters.
Warwick said: “It’ll be very tough. The fixtures I’ve come in to have been against teams in the top six or seven. I’m not saying anybody is less than us as we’re at the bottom but our fixtures are the top six or eight teams.
“For the club to survive it needs to have an infrastructure for the future. In the short-term we’re going to keep swinging and if we go down, we will go down swinging. We have improved the team and brought in two or three decent players but we’re still miles away.”
