Friday 24th March 2017
SONS are off to the seaside this Saturday, where Ayr United await for an important game in the Ladbrokes SPFL Championship.
Gaffer Stevie Aitken is not keen to buy into the ‘must-win game’ formula, believing each encounter must be approached with a determination to achieve victory, given that anyone can beat anyone else on the day in this league.
Craig Charleston is this weekend’s referee (he also was in charge of the last match at Somerset between the two clubs) and he will be assisted by Willie Conquer and Steven Strang.
In three league games this season on a head-to-head basis, Ayr’s Honest Men have gathered five points from a possible nine. Fifteen goals have been scored in total over the matches so far and a total of 3,644 fans watched the trio of games.
Prior to this campaign, both clubs had not met since season 2010/11 in the old Second Division (now League One) The results were: Saturday 21st August 2010 – Ayr United 1 Dumbarton 0; Saturday 13th November 2010 – Dumbarton 3 Ayr United 2; Sunday 2nd January 2011 – Ayr United 2 Dumbarton 0; and Saturday 21st April 2011 – Dumbarton 1 Ayr United 2.
In term son player connections, the name which stands out to Sons fans is Nicky Devlin. The big breakthrough at Motherwell never materialised for the former Dumbarton youth player, but his career has taken a new direction to the extent that he is now team captain at Somerset Park aged only 22.
His fellow full-back Pat Boyle is another player with DFC connections as part of the 2009 Third Division title-winning squad.
So how is our record at Somerset Park? Well, Sons are currently looking at a 12 year wait for a victory there. That last win was on Saturday, 23rd October 2004, when Andy Rodgers scored the game’s only goal in injury time.
In player news, Daniel Harvie and Ross McCrorie are unavailable for this game, however Mark Docherty returns to the squad after a period of suspension.
Alan Findlay, Andy Galloway & Simon Barrow