'It's shambolic to be honest' - Bo'ness United boss Max Christie wants fixture rescheduling to help clubs avoid injury crises

Christie’s injury ravaged side has been struggling with unavailable players for weeks due to the rigours of playing on several midweeks at a key point of the campaign.

"The high number of fixtures recently has put great stress on us,” Christie said.

"Out of a squad of 19 we’ve had nine out injured so it’s really been very difficult.

"I do not understand why we’ve had to have so many midweek games at the tail end of the season.

"It’s shambolic I think to be honest. I would like to see the games spread out more over the season. Every team in the league has got floodlights.

"The last five weeks for us have been playing games Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday.

"So now we’re just playing really, doing a warm-up and patching people up to get on.

"I think the Lowland League need to look at playing more midweek games in the summer months as opposed to cramming everything in at the end which certainly for us has been the case. We’ve been going just short of a year now.”

United’s depleted squad battled to a 2-1 Lowland League Cup quarter-final win at Edinburgh University on Saturday.

Lennon Walker fired the BUs into a 53rd minute lead before away keeper Andy Murphy saved a penalty awarded for a Lewis Hawkins foul just two minutes later.

Although Edinburgh Uni did score on 57 minutes, Gregor Nicol netted the Bo’ness winner on 59 minutes to set up a semi-final against East Stirlingshire at Falkirk on Saturday, May 7.

"We were 1-0 up having played well first half,” Christie said.

"Lennon scored a great goal, controlling the ball in mid air and hitting it before it hit the ground. It was a high level of skill to score the goal and very quick. He’s been doing well for us.

"The penalty looked a wee bit soft but Andy did well to save it. Then they scored after it but I thought we were in control of the game.

"We went on to play very well and scored a good goal through Gregor. The two boys up front are both 18 years old and they’ve done well recently.

"We should have scored more. It was a good performance.”

United’s hectic programme continues with a Scottish Lowland Football League trip to Dalbeattie Star on Saturday, followed by a league game at Gala Fairydean Rovers next Wednesday night.