PYF Saltires in homegrown bid to take on UEFA Champions League

The Scottish champions jetted out to Slovakia this week for their qualifying group and will face three matches across the next four days.

Their squad is very much homegrown too with the majority coming through the youth setup and hailing from Perth itself.

Of their 14 players, only Dundee-based Ahmed Aloulou – formerly of Alloa Athletic – isn’t from the Fair City while Saltires also have the likes of ex-Dundee United kid Scott Smith in their ranks.

First up is Estonian champions Cosmos on Wednesday before facing hosts and top seeds Lucenec on Thursday and Encamp of Andorra on Saturday.

“We got a squad of 14 going which is bigger than previously,” explained PYF Saltires’ Kyle Ballingall, who also captains the Scotland national team.

“Nine of those players have come through the youth academy at PYF and we have five players from our Colts team who play in the Dundee regional league.

“So we our team is almost all Perth-based, apart from Ahmed Aloulou. Thirteen out of 14 are Perth-based and pretty much homegrown.

“That’s what we’ve always wanted to do so we’re looking forward to it.

“It’s now time to get on court and put all the hard work into practice.”

Injection

Ballingall himself has been out of action since Saltires were last in the Champions League, damaging his ankle in the first match.

But he’ll be available in Slovakia.

“I’m feeling good, feeling better than I have,” he added.

“I’ll see how it is over there.

“The injury came in the first five minutes of the first game last time around.

“I’ve had an injection in July to speed things up but I’m fit to play.”

Prep

Preparation has seen a double-header on the same day in Ireland against Irish champions

Blue Magic and Northern Ireland league winners Sparta Belfast.

A trip down south saw them face Manchester Futsal and Bloomsbury, England’s Champions League representatives before final warm-ups against Dundee side FC33 and Fife outfit Futsal Escocia.

Now the task is to dispel an unwanted tag given by media in Slovakia.

“The last two qualification groups we’ve picked up points – we beat Lynx two years ago and drew with the top seeds Gentofte last year,” Kyle said.

“So we want to do similar, we want to get points on the board.

“We want to compete in all three games. Looking back at last year is we want to impose ourselves on the games a bit better.

“Last year we conceded the joint-least in the third and fourth placed teams across the whole competition which is good. But we also scored the least so want to keep that defence but pick our moments to get at teams more.

“We want points on the board but also to impose ourselves on the group.

“We’ve already been labelled by one of the other teams as ‘hammer-throwers’ in the local newspaper in Slovakia!

"So we want to show we can play a bit."