Largs Thistle manger Bryan Slavin has said that his players are raring to go for his management home debut at Barrfields on Saturday against Cumbernauld United, 2pm kick-off.

Largs are missing midfielder Stevie Kyle due to a long term injury, while Iain Fisher is on the sidelines due to an ankle injury but has stepped up his training, and making strides towards returning to fitness. Goalkeeper Grant Weir has also returned to fitness after a shoulder injury, and now faces competition from new signing Ross Lundy for the number one spot.

Bryan said: “I have known Ross from my last playing stint at Saltcoats and he impressed me down there. He is still a young keeper, and is a great option to bring in - he is a big goalie, and a great shotstopper. He will push Grant, and Grant will push Ross, and we will see how they train on Wednesday evening, before making our selection for Saturday.” “If I am being honest, we do not know a great deal about Cumbernauld. They maybe have a wee bit more quality than Ardeer, and I anticipate that it is going to be a tight game, but hopefully playing it on the astroturf will suit us better. "We will be after the three points - we will always be looking to take the front foot, and go in with a positive approach to try and win the game.

“We want to be expansive and positive, specially on the park. and we will have a go at anybody on our park with the players we have.” And Bryan, and assistant Staurt Davidson, are greatly looking forward to making their home debut, although they wish it could have been sooner: “It is fairly unusual to have been in charge for nearly a month, and not yet have had our first home game. I always felt at Auchinleck that there was always more of a pressure at home to win games as we were expected to win all our games. The good news from our point of view is that we have got the monkey off our back with regard to our first win at Ardeer.

“We are really looking forward to it - and we are going to be postive and send the boys out to do a job.” However, the Thistle boss admits that the preparations have not been ideal with the lack of home games, and lack of matches generally meaning that it is difficult to assess the players in match only situations.

He said: “It is a bit annoying that we have only had one game in almost a month - it is a bit of an issue for both of us. We have got a full squad to choose from, and with only one game against Ardeer, we have to make an educated guess on players purely based on training as we have not seem then in game situations. I don’t like to leave things to chance, and hopefully that can be transferred across to the game sufficently.

“Beith had booked Barrfields on Saturday, apparently for a league game against Petershill, but then they had a friendly against Rob Roy instead. I don’t know the ins and outs of it but it held us back, and ideally, we would have had a friendly on Saturday but it wasn’t possible, with our game at Irvine Vics off.

“We took the players on a run along the seafront to the marina and back, and a few drills on the seafront, and then half an hour on the park to get a touch of the ball. We made good use of what we had but ideally it was not the greatest preparation. It was a shame as the weather was great for football on Saturday afternoon.” * Largs have been drawn against Beith at Barrfields in the first round of the Ayrshire Weekly Press Cup in a date still to be arranged. Thistle are also due to play Beith away in the West of Scotland Cup 2nd round.

* The winner of the Largs Thistle 200 Club for January was Linda Crawford of Bishopton, who wins £250.

* Support Thistle! All children under the age of 16 will be admitted to home games for free until the end of the season. The club initiative was previously if only accompanied by an adult, children could go free, but the club have extended the policy.