Gary Heatly looks ahead to Sunday’s matches in the Scottish Cup…
The Scottish Cup has reached the quarter-final stage and you can forgive players from all eight clubs left in the draw if they are beginning to dream about lifting the famous trophy on August 22 at New Cambusdoon in Ayr.
However, there is a lot of cricket to be played before that becomes a realty for one club and there are some tasty looking ties in the last eight this Sunday.
Having won four from four before this weekend in the Western Premier Division, Clydesdale will travel to Albert Park to take on Langside as favourites.
Langside, formerly Weirs, will be tough opponents though and since they gained promotion to the Western Premier Division in 2019 they have been slowly building.
And skipper Sameer Zia and his men have shown in their league victory over Prestwick and their Cup round two win over Ayr that when they get it right, especially in the bowling department, then they can be a match for anyone.
“We are all really enjoying this season so far, testing ourselves against the best clubs week in and week out in the league and also making it this far in the Cup,” Zia states.
“When we earned promotion two years ago we knew that it would be a big step up for our squad from the First Division to the Western Premier Division as many of our players had not played in the top flight before.
“There have been some tough days this season, but we are learning all of the time and we took confidence by beating Ayr by seven wickets in the last round of the Cup.
“This weekend we are due to play Clydesdale twice at home, in the league on Saturday and then the Cup on Sunday, and these are the types of big matches we as a club want to be involved in.
“To reach the semi-finals of the Cup would be a big thing for Langside.”
Clydesdale have beaten Poloc and Stoneywood Dyce to date to get this far and last won the Cup as recently as 2016.
Gen!us Grange, the 2018 winners, host ion8 Forfarshire in their quarter-final in what is an all-Eastern Premier Division battle.
The sides are also due to meet at the same Portgower Place ground in the league on July 10, so they will get to know each other well over the next week or so.
Holders Heriot’s, who won the event in 2019, welcome 1989 winners McCrea FS West of Scotland to Goldenacre in the third of the quarter-finals.
Many will remember the exciting ‘East v West’ match these two sides had at the same stage two years ago at the same ground, Heriot’s battling back, led by a great spell of bowling from Callum Stuart, to progress.
In the fourth quarter-final, Western First Division side Drumpellier host 2017 finalists Watsonians at Langloan.
Josh Allison’s men are the only non-top flight side left in the competition, but on their home patch they will be looking to give Pete Maksimczyk’s Eastern Premier Division men a run for their money.
Langside captain Sameer Zia is pictured batting by David Potter
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