Stirling Albion were handed a home tie against League One side Airdrieonians when the draw for the first round of the League Cup was made on Monday.

The sides met four times as the Binos were relegated to League Two last season, with two draws and two defeats for the Forthbank side, writes Jamie Hall.

The tie will be played at Forthbank on Saturday 1 August, and manager Stuart McLaren declared himself happy with the draw.

He told Stirling News Sport: “There’s two ways to look at it and both have their merits. It is going to be a challenging game because Airdrie are a more than capable opponent.

“They’ll be competing in the league above and they will be trying to assemble a squad capable of achieving promotion from that division, whether that is by winning the league or through the playoffs. But we think we are building a squad which is capable of challenging for promotion from League Two.

“We have a lot of players with good League One experience and a lot of players who were coveted by League One clubs.

“Playing at home will give us an advantage, and if we can get some good support behind us then I think there’s a really good opportunity for us to go on and progress in the cup.” The Binos boss was glad to have avoided a similar tie to the trip to Elgin which awaits his side in the Petrofac Training Cup, but insisted the arduous journey north would provide useful information ahead of the two sides’ league meeting in August.

He added: “When you look at the cup draws, everybody wants the big-name teams or to be drawn at home, but that’s the luck of the draw. The advantage is that we can go there and treat it as a dress rehearsal for the league match there at the end of August.

“It gives us the chance to make sure we get our timings right in terms of when we depart Stirling and establish where we are stopping for food and make sure all those details are right.

“Obviously we want to do well in the challenge cup but it gives us a bit of a trial run for the league game when we will be playing for points, because that will have more importance in terms of what we are trying to achieve this season.”