Brad Spencer on Falkirk's approach to Scottish Premiership step up and Brian Graham's kind words last term

Brad Spencer believes his Falkirk team-mates can make the step up to the Scottish Premiership without too much of a fuss - but concedes that the Bairns will need to “add different strings” to their attacking, free-flowing style of play if they want to be successful.

The midfielder, 29, was a key figure in the middle of the park for John McGlynn’s second-tier champions, picking up the PFA Scotland Championship Player of the Season award for his performances across the campaign. Falkirk secured the title in style, scoring 72 goals over 36 matches.

The back-to-back SPFL title winners now, however, face a different challenge in the Premiership after 15 years away from the top table. And that is something that Spencer - who is set to extend his current Falkirk contract - is acutely aware of.

Bairns will be smart with style of play in Premiership

“Yeah, definitely,” he said when asked if the Bairns would be adaptive this season. “We had success last year against a couple of Premiership teams and we still played our way in those games. Obviously at times we had to sit out and soak a wee bit more pressure up and rely on a wee bit of luck or things like that, Nicky (Hogarth) had to make saves last year. So it’s obviously going to be different. We just need to add different strings to our bow type thing and try to go out and find the best way to win games.”

“I think the gaffer’s always stressed that about keeping the continuity together and keeping the feel-good factor about the place. I think if you go and start ripping everything apart then you’re starting from the bare bones and starting right at the start. Whereas we are two or three years into our journey. We know what to expect from the gaffer and Smudgers, which suits a lot at us. So there’s no point in coming up and just ripping everything up and starting again. It’s worked and it’s a style of play that suits a lot of our boys and a lot of our players. I think that’s how we get the best out of people like myself, Dylan, the wingers and everybody else. The boys that it suits, it suits us all to a T. So there’s no point in stripping everything back to the bones and starting from scratch.”

Experience being added is a good thing for Falkirk, says Spencer

Stand-in captain Spencer had the armband for most of last season with Coll Donaldson crocked. He was praised by his boss McGlynn for his leadership within the group throughout the season - and he’ll once again be a key character on and off the pitch. But Spencer knows that having more experience heading into the Premiership is key, and that the recent additions of Brian Graham and Scott Bain are players that he - and the squad - can learn from.

“I’ve known Brian for a while,” Spencer said. “Obviously playing against him, you get to chat. But it’s kind of the first time that I’ve met Scott. He seems a lovely lad, also another good character the gaffer’s picked. He’s got a knack of picking good players to have around the dressing room. It would be daft not to lean on their experience. They’ve both been around the game for a long time, along with Scotty Arfield. It’s an experienced group now, compared to last year when we were a wee bit younger. We’ve got a wee bit of a mixture now, we’ve got pace, we’ve got experience and things like that. So it’s exciting times.”

Spencer reveals Graham’s title message after Partick Thistle defeat

Meanwhile, looking back on last season, Spencer revealed that former Partick Thistle striker Graham showed his class after the Bairns’ bruising 2-1 defeat at Firhill on the penultimate matchday. Falkirk could have all-but sealed the title that night but they suffered a last-gasp shocker again when Terry Ablade scored in injury-time.

After a series of setbacks, it felt like the second-tier title was genuinely in play again with Livingston closing in on the McGlynn’s men. And despite the elation of just having helped secure a crucial win as Thistle interim co-boss - Graham took the time to console Spencer at full-time.

“He came up to us after,” the midfielder revealed. “I was speaking to Brian before about the player of the year and stuff like that. He just came up to me after and said something about it being a great year for myself and then just go on and win it, he’s desperate for us to win it, we deserve to win it, and you’ll go and get the job done next week. Obviously in the end we did. I definitely had different words in my head that came out at the time to tell Brian! Just because I was annoyed at how the game went. He was just being professional, it was lovely words from Brian and obviously in the end there were people that were rooting for us to go out and do the job because we consistently were the best team in the league. It was nice from Brian.”

McGlynn says Spencer transfer claims are ‘rubbish’

Meanwhile, McGlynn has rubbished claims suggesting a handful of Premiership rivals were closing in on signing Spencer.

Previous reporting from The Daily Record suggested that the Tynecastle club’s Jamestown Analytics’ partnership highlighted the 29-year-old as a potential signing target for new boss Derek McInnes. More recently, Hibs and Dundee were also linked with moves for Spencer. But McGlynn says those claims were wide of the mark – and that Falkirk are actually closing in on handing the midfielder a new contract.

"No-one has approached the football club, no-one has mentioned him,” McGlynn said. “It is just pure speculation. We are actually negotiating a new deal for Brad at the moment.”