DARVEL delighted plenty of punters when they landed one of the great Scottish football gambles after pulling off the biggest Scottish Cup shock in history by beating Aberdeen last month.
But anyone looking for a repeat of the 50/1 odds that day that was backed into 8/1 at kick off will be in for a disappointment when they play League One Falkirk on Monday night.
Bookies have quickly realised that Darvel are really a mid-table-to-lower League One club in disguise. Nine of the starting XI that defeated Aberdeen had major Scottish League experience and the two that didn't were goalkeeper Chris Truesdale, who was Man of the Match and striker Allan MacKenzie, who is their top scorer.
This is basically the equivalent of Falkirk playing the likes of FC Edinburgh or Montrose away from home on a Monday night. The only difference is the Recreation Park pitch is grass and significantly better.
As wary as the Bairns will be going into this after what happened to a Dons side who were in absolute freefall, John McGlynn's men are in fine form – a midweek draw at Alloa stopped a winning run of six games in a row.
Darvel – West of Scotland Premier League leaders – lost at Arthurlie in their very next match after their historic Cup win, but have since bounced back with wins over Clydebank and Irvine Meadow.
How the bookies view it
As stated, there are no huge odds this time, although plenty will pile on to BetVictor's 17/4 for a home win.
Falkirk can be backed at 4/7 with Boylesports. The draw is 10/3 with McBookie.com.
Recent head to head
The clubs have never met.
Players to watch
It will probably only be the morning of the match when goalscorer odds come up, but although former St Mirren player Jordan Kirkpatrick grabbed the headlines in the last round for the famous winner against Aberdeen, Allan MacKenzie could be the man to watch, having scored 11 league goals so far this season in 16 games.
Rumarn Burrell is enjoying a fine spell for Falkirk with four goals in his last six games.
Anything else catch the eye?
Darvel's fairytale success has been rightly celebrated, but Falkirk should be too strong here and can get through to the next round.
Although Darvel's win was the stuff of dreams, let's not forget they were the beneficiaries of one of the most outrageously wrong offside calls in the history of the game against Aberdeen and their goalkeeper had a dream night.
It's also unlikely Falkirk will fall into the trap of playing a weakened team as Jim Goodwin did and nor will they underestimate the Ayrshire side like the Dons.
Falkirk are slightly too short to back on their own, but they will surely start fast here and the 6/5 on them to win half time and full time with McBookie.com is begging to be backed.
If Darvel fall behind, they could get caught out and they average losing more than a goal a game at the sixth-tier level they are at – 21 goals in 16 league games – so try Falkirk to score over 2.5 team goals at 13/8 with bet365.
This Scottish Cup match between Darvel and Falkirk will be played on Feb 13, 2023 and kick off at 19:45. Check below for our tipsters best Darvel vs Falkirk prediction. You may also visit our dedicated betting previews section for the most up to date previews.
