Premier Sports Cup draw explained: Who Hibs, Livingston, Edinburgh City and Bonnyrigg Rose could get and how to watch

The draw for the group stage will be made on Wednesday, May 25, at 1pm.

The draw will be shown live by Premier Sports via its FreeSports channel. FreeSports is available on Freeview HD channel 65, Sky HD channel 422, Virgin HD 553, TalkTalk 64, BT Vision channel 64 and is also available via Samsung TV Player and on the FreeSports Player.

Celtic, Rangers, Hearts, Motherwell and Dundee United all qualified for Europe and therefore miss the group stage. They receive a bye into the last-16 knockout round. The group stage draw will involve the other 37 SPFL clubs from 2021/22, Cowdenbeath included, plus Highland League champions Fraserburgh and Lowland League champions Bonnyrigg Rose Athletic. The additional slot will be taken by Highland League runners-up Buckie Thistle, following a decision by the SPFL board, as the Lowland League were given the extra place last season.

The 40 clubs will be drawn into eight groups of five on a seeded basis. Details of the seeding pots will be confirmed ahead of the draw. Following a recommendation from the SPFL competitions working group, regionalisation has been removed for 2022/23, after six years of the North/South split in the group stage. The eight group winners and three best runners-up will join the five European entrants in the last 16 of the tournament at the end of August.

Bonnyrigg Rose are in the competition for the first time after winning the Lowland League and the group stage will provide the Midlothian side with a rigorous warm-up for their inaugural SPFL League 2 campaign. Given that the draw is seeded, it is possible that one of the groups could include Hibs, Dunfermline, Falkirk, Edinburgh City and Bonnyrigg Rose. Plenty of local derbies if that were to happen. Bonnyrigg