Owen Coyle urged his Queen’s Park side to grasp their chance to reach the top flight with a cinch Championship shoot-out win over Dundee on Friday night.
The Glasgow side, who are ground sharing with Stenhousemuir while Lesser Hampden is being revamped, are two points behind the Tayside outfit at the top of the table with the title and an automatic place in the cinch Premiership up for grabs in the final fixture.
In what promises to be one of the most exciting finales to the Championship campaign as nine teams still have something to play for, Queen’s Park, Scotland’s oldest senior club, are looking for a remarkable third successive promotion.
Boss Coyle, on their official Twitter account, said: “We are full of excitement. Looking forward to an unbelievable night. A chance to be champions of the Championship.
“Given the journey we have been on, to be given the opportunity to take Queen’s Park into the Premiership, I think at the start of the season we would have done somersaults for that opportunity.
“If someone said in the last game of the season you would be at your home from home with the chance to win the game and go into the Premiership as champions, of course we would have grasped that.
“What we have to do is deliver on that and that needs a big performance, one that we are more than capable of.
“I am pretty sure the lads are as excited as I am about the game.”
Coyle concedes that having to win the game against Dundee makes the task straightforward.
The former Burnley, Bolton and Ross County manager said: “We know we have to win. Obviously Dundee are at the top of the league at the moment.
“They know they can afford a draw and be champions.
“That itself probably sets you in a quandary while we know we have to win the game so that is our mind-set, to go and win the game against a good side, good players, big squad, a Premiership club, as we know.
“But what we have to do is show that we want to be that Premiership club and we have 90/95 minutes to do that.
“We need to be at our best. We have shown that when we are at our best we win games.
“We have won more games than any other team in this league up to this point because we play to win games. That is why the game on Friday suits us.
“We go all out to win games, we commit players forward and look to have that creativity that we have been known for to create the chances to ultimately scores goals because we will have to score to win the game.”
Promotion play-off spots are still to be confirmed with two points between third-placed Partick Thistle and Morton in sixth spot.
Thistle, who are two points behind Queen’s Park, travel to Raith Rovers, the only club with nothing to play for in terms of either going up or going down.
Scottish Cup finalists Inverness host Ayr United and Morton travel to second-bottom Cove Rangers who have the chance to move out of the relegation play-off spot.
Bottom side Hamilton, who are one point behind Cove, take on Arbroath at Gayfield knowing they need to get at least a point to avoid automatic relegation.
Dundee 1-2 Celtic: Forrest brace restores Hoops' three-point lead at SPL summit
James Forrest scored twice as Celtic regained their three-point cushion at the Scottish Premiership summit with a narrow 2-1 victory over Dundee.
Rangers had applied the pressure earlier in the day with a 2-1 win at St Mirren, moving Philippe Clement's side level on points with the Hoops.
Although, Celtic did not twitch with Forrest volleying them ahead on the half-hour mark, before doubling their lead in the 67th minute.
Antonio Portales pulled a goal back for Dundee seven minutes later with his first league strike of the season, but the visitors held on to pull clear at the top once more with five games remaining.
Data debrief
Returning to the starting line-up today, Forrest's double separated the sides as he found the net more than once in a game for the first time since scoring a hat-trick against Hibernian in October 2022.
Celtic have now won their last 10 league matches against Dundee and are unbeaten in 43 meetings overall since a 2-0 defeat in May 2001, only enjoying a longer such streak against Dumbarton (50).
Dundee 1-2 Celtic: Forrest braces restores Hoops' three-point lead at SPL summit
James Forrest scored twice as Celtic regained their three-point cushion at the Scottish Premiership summit with a narrow 2-1 victory over Dundee.
Rangers had applied the pressure earlier in the day with a 2-1 win at St Mirren, moving Philippe Clement's side level on points with the Hoops.
Although, Celtic did not twitch with Forrest volleying them ahead on the half-hour mark, before doubling their lead in the 67th minute.
Antonio Portales pulled a goal back for Dundee seven minutes later with his first league strike of the season, but the visitors held on to pull clear at the top once more with five games remaining.
Data debrief
Returning to the starting line-up today, Forrest's double separated the sides as he found the net more than once in a game for the first time since scoring a hat-trick against Hibernian in October 2022.
Celtic have now won their last 10 league matches against Dundee and are unbeaten in 43 meetings overall since a 2-0 defeat in May 2001, only enjoying a longer such streak against Dumbarton (50).
Dundee consider appeal against six-figure fine for postponements over poor pitch
Dundee are considering an appeal after being handed a six-figure fine – most of which is suspended – following a disciplinary hearing over their troublesome pitch.
The Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) announced that a fine of £186,000 had been handed down.
However, £120,000 of the punishment is suspended until the end of next season and will only be triggered by a further breach of rules.
Dundee disagreed with the wording of the SPFL press release, claiming they had been fined £150,000 in total with an additional £36,429.60 fee payable as compensation to the SPFL for television and pitch specialist costs.
The cinch Premiership club say the additional £120,000 fine would be “automatically triggered in the event of a single waterlogged pitch postponement next season”.
A statement added: “Dundee Football Club are deeply disappointed with the severity of the punishment and are currently seeking legal advice with regards to an appeal.
“The club will be making no further comment on the outcome while we seek legal advice.”
The league said that Dundee had admitted five separate breaches of SPFL rules relating to their Dens Park pitch following five postponements of league matches this season.
An SPFL spokesman said: “SPFL rules on pitch condition are an integral part of maintaining a fair league competition.”
Two of the postponements – against Rangers and Aberdeen – came within 90 minutes of kick-off and a recent game against Motherwell only went ahead following a late pitch inspection, with visiting manager Stuart Kettlewell subsequently arguing that areas were unplayable.
The rearranged match against Rangers was postponed again last week and a contingency plan was made to play the game at St Johnstone’s McDiarmid Park before the game finally went ahead at Dundee’s home ground on Wednesday, with the match ending goalless.
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