He may now be 65 years young but the Scottish Cup still sets Dick Campbell’s pulse racing.
It was the veteran Arbroath manager’s milestone birthday on Thursday and he is hoping to have more to celebrate this evening with the Red Lichties hopefully into the next round of the competition after beating Stranraer.
The Angus outfit are still unbeaten in League 1 this season and further cemented their place at the top of the table with a 5-1 thumping over near neighbours Brechin last Saturday.
Campbell, who began an eight-match touchline ban at the Glebe, was full of praise for his team and he is looking for more of the same today at Gayfield in the cup.
He said: “In all the years I have been a manager, and that is a long, long time, last Saturday’s performance was one of the best from any of my teams.
“I was obviously sat up in the stand and it was great to watch.
“It was 18 minutes before my goalie touched the ball as we launched wave after wave of attacks.
“The lads were absolutely outstanding.
“But we now have a break from league business and we look forward to the visit of Stranraer in the Scottish Cup.”
Campbell added: “We have doubts over Gavin Swankie and Michael McKenna and we will make late decisions on the pair of them but hopefully they will be fit to play.
“The cup is very important to the club and is something for everyone to get excited about – players, management and fans.
“It will be a tough game and the other thing we have to overcome now is that every team is after us.
“They all have Arbroath in their sights but that is something we will just have to deal with.”
One player who will definitely not be in Arbroath’s squad this afternoon is former Brechin midfielder Finn Graham who left the club on Thursday to join Barry Ferguson’s East of Scotland League team Kelty Hearts.
Campbell added: “I have let Finn go to Kelty and he leaves with our best wishes.
“Finn is a great lad but he wasn’t playing for us.
“It leaves us a bit short in terms of squad numbers but it is a good move for him.”
