In pictures: Falkirk v Cove Rangers, their last six matches

Their opponents then are Cove Rangers and that League 1 game is taking place at their Balmoral Stadium home ground in Aberdeen, with kick-off at 3pm.

Rangers, unbeaten at home thus far, are currently top of the table with 51 points from 24 games, seven points clear of second-placed Airdrieonians and on course for their third promotion in four seasons, and current head coach Martin Rennie’s Bairns are four league places and 19 points worse off.

Falkirk and the Aberdonians haven’t got a lot of history, the latter only having moved up into the Scottish Professional Football League from the game’s fifth tier in 2019, though they did meet in the Scottish Cup the year before.

The little competitive history they do have – extending only to six games, the five most recent of them in League 1 and the one before in the Scottish Cup – has seen honours shared exactly evenly, with two wins apiece and two draws.

Last time out, Cove racked up a 3-0 win at the Falkirk Stadium on Saturday, December 11, with Morgyn Neill, Rory McAllister and Leighton McIntosh scoring against interim manager Danny Grainger’s hosts.

Their other meeting so far this season, in Aberdeen on Saturday, July 31, ended 1-1, with Aidan Nesbitt scoring for ex-head coach Paul Sheerin’s visitors and McAllister replying for the hosts.

Their last game of the season before, in Falkirk on Saturday, April 24, was also a draw, 2-2, with Callumn Morrison and Conor Sammon on target for the Bairns, managed by Gary Holt, and McIntosh and Mitchel Megginson getting Cove’s goals.

Rangers won the game before 2-0, in the north east a week previously on Saturday, April 17, with Megginson netting both.

Falkirk drew first blood in their first league game of the 2020/21 season – and, indeed, ever – with a Morrison goal securing a 1-0 home win for the Bairns, managed at that point by Lee Miller and David McCracken, on Saturday, November 21, 2020.

Their only preceding competitive meeting was a 3-1 Scottish Cup win for the Bairns, managed at the time by current Cove boss Paul Hartley, at Inverurie’s Harlaw Park. Alex Jakubiak scored twice for Falkirk, with Craig Sibbald netting the other. Megginson made the hosts’ only contribution to the scoresheet with what would turn out to be the first of five goals against Falkirk in six games.

Here’s how those games went in pictures ...