Threave Rovers start West of Scotland third division campaign against familiar opponents

Threave Rovers begin life in a new division against familiar opponents on Saturday.

The Castle Douglas side won promotion from the fourth division of the West of Scotland League at the first attempt.

And on Saturday they host Kilsyth Athletic – one of two teams who finished above them last season.

But despite having faced them last term, Threave boss Vinnie Parker has been struggling to find out how they’ve changed since then.

He said: “The big plus these days with social media is its a bit easier to look at people’s games and signings, but they’ve been pretty quiet.

“We’ve had to go hunting footage and ask questions. It seems they’ve retained what they had last year and will definitely be strong.

“Their manager has been full-time at one of the senior clubs and knows the game well so it’ll be a hard challenge.”

Another promotion push could be on the cards for Threave as they look to continue their climb back up the Scottish football pyramid after opting to drop from the sixth to the 10th tier last summer.

But Parker isn’t getting too carried away just yet.

He said: “One of the mistakes I made last year was to say from the onset we were looking for promotion.

“We know from looking at this league last year that 10 wins secures your position in the league.

“The first target is 10 wins and we’ll take it from there.”

Threave’s final friendly saw them go to Ayrshire to face Darvel on Saturday.

Last season’s Scottish Cup shock troops recorded a 4-0 win.

Parker said: “I felt they were a level above what we’d come up against.

“They were sharp, especially in the final third.

“The way they managed to bop it round the corners was brilliant. They’re a really, really good side.

“I thought we managed