Elgin City manager Ross Draper talks about his team’s SPFL Trust Trophy win over St Johnstone B and his new signings at Borough Briggs.
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00:00 Right Ross, you'll be very pleased with the team's performance, a very young team out
00:03 there today and a satisfactory win over a good young St John's inside?
00:07 Yeah, I thought it was a good game. Like you said, it's the next stage for us in terms
00:14 of where we're at. A couple of new additions make a big difference and I thought it was
00:18 a better performance than what we had in the Cup games. Not that they were bad but we were
00:23 just a little bit short and a couple of new additions make a huge difference. It was a
00:28 good team performance, like you said, it's still a young side. When we bring another
00:33 couple into it, Jake and Koop's back from injury and obviously still looking to add
00:37 two or three elsewhere. We're making progress and tonight it's a positive one and we move
00:44 forward to Strandmore.
00:45 The opening goal was a very nice take from Ryan, that's his first goal for the club and
00:49 he took it very well from the edge of the net.
00:51 Yeah, he's got a great left foot, very technically very good. We've seen that in training and
00:55 games that we've played so I know what he brings in terms of that and he can play wide
01:00 or centrally as well. As soon as he lined it up, I knew he wouldn't be far away. Good
01:09 for him to get his first goal as well, good for Ben to get his first goal. It's important
01:13 for these boys to get off the mark with confidence and everything that comes with it.
01:17 And another player who will come in tonight is Conor Ewan from Ross County, he's 17 years
01:20 old and a very mature performance from him.
01:22 Yes, very mature. You wouldn't probably guess his age if you looked at him, how vocal he
01:28 is, how much of a leader he is. He's a man, he's a physically big and strong boy so he
01:34 doesn't shirk away from anything. It's one that we've wanted to get in from the closed
01:39 season to get it done. Numbers at Ross County obviously delayed that a little bit which
01:43 is no problem. We're just glad to get him in and done now.
01:47 And the real business starts on Saturday, the start of the League 2 campaign against
01:50 Stranvar. It's obviously a positive result tonight to put guys in good fettle for that
01:54 and with some players to come into the squad as well.
01:56 Yes, regardless of who you're playing or what age people are, clean sheet tonight and two
02:02 goals and it possibly could have been a couple more in terms of us finishing chances. So
02:09 it's positive, as I said to the boys after the game, it's getting into the habits of
02:14 winning games, getting into the habits of keeping clean sheets and taking pride in terms
02:17 of defending your goal. We've given probably a lot of cheap goals away in the cup competitions
02:22 despite the quality of team that you're playing against. It needs to be harder to beat, it
02:29 needs to be harder to score against. So tonight's a positive and like you said we move on to
02:33 Stranvar and it'll be a big year and it'll be a good test for us.
02:37 The start of the League campaign and you seem to have been largely written off in certain
02:41 circles, bookmakers and predictions and so forth are always putting you bottom of the
02:45 list in terms of title contenders, does that work in your favour?
02:48 I didn't know that, it doesn't bother us at all. We're a tight group and like you said
02:54 we continue to add boys, you see the quality that we've added in make a huge difference
02:59 so we're not done in terms of that. So if bookies and pundits or whatever want to write
03:05 us off that's fine by me, we'll go with the underdog kind of tag.
03:09 And you speak about additions to the squad, could you potentially get anything done in
03:13 time for the Stranvar game?
03:17 Possibly, yeah, everyone's working hard behind the scenes, they're kind of bored and everyone's
03:24 been brilliant in terms of backing us and wanting to get things done, whether that's
03:29 a loan or transfers. They've been brilliant and my support for myself so hopefully there's
03:35 a potential of one or two, like I said whether they get done by Stranvar or not might be
03:41 too soon but we'll certainly try and have a good go at it.
03:44 And you said that once the Stranvar game came around you would have shaped far more of the
03:48 squad that you really wanted to have in place, you must feel you're really close to being
03:52 there now?
03:53 Yeah, we're probably two, three, maybe four away but that's the way we wanted to do it,
04:00 we didn't want to panic, maybe we've sacrificed the cup competition and even tonight we've
04:08 got a small squad with a young squad and not many subs but I know that when we get the
04:14 boys back like Matthew Cooper and Jake Dolzanski back, he's added quality to the squad and
04:21 we don't want to panic and go out and get boys that, just to make up the numbers, we
04:25 want a smaller squad with quality and I think we've done that with the recruitment. When
04:30 we do get two or three more I think we'll be stronger for it.
04:33 You speak about some of these guys that have come in in defensive positions, you took yourself
04:36 out of the team tonight of course, gave yourself a little bit of a rest, which is a benefit
04:40 for you to be seeing things from the sidelines as well isn't it?
04:43 Yeah, first game in terms of not being involved, enjoyed it, you get to sit back and watch
04:49 things and certainly from the bench you see a lot more than you do playing so it's an
04:53 option we've brought in defensive players, like I said when we bring Jake and Coops back
05:00 we're strong in terms of your back four so if it's one that I miss out and pull myself
05:05 out of the team then that's fine, that's what we want to do, I'm not going to play myself
05:08 for the sake of it. If we've got quality to bring in then they'll certainly play ahead
05:13 of me.
05:14 Blair McKenzie back for Saturday as well, he's on Aberdeen duty this week isn't he?
05:18 Yes, he's away playing for Aberdeen tomorrow so something that we can't help, he's part
05:28 of the Aberdeen squad so hopefully he comes through injury free and he's available for