Football Season Guide

Montrose enjoyed their most successful season in nine years despite losing to Peterhead in the play-offs. They can take plenty of encouragement into the new term having enjoyed their most successful campaign in a decade and the club will delighted to have secured Stewart Petrie as manager on a new two-year contract in the summer. Petrie has turned the Gable Endies' fortunes around since taking over the reigns in November and he acted quickly during the close season to re-sign most of his squad. Goalkeepers Allan Fleming and Jordan Millar were both given a chance to show what they could do between the sticks and will fight it out for the Number 1 position whilst defender Andrew Steeves enjoyed his most productive season to date. Midfielder Terry Masson has signed up again whilst strikers Chris Templeman and Gary Fraser bring plenty of experience and will want to improve on the 24 goals they bagged between them. Petrie has allowed a number of squad players to leave the club and the only loss is that of full-back Callum Ballantyne, who was outstanding whilst on loan from Dundee United. The manager will be delighted to have made defender Matty Allan's loan move from Dundee permanent this summer whilst the capture of defender Sean Dillon from Dundee United looks like a statement of intent. The signings of midfield duo of Jamie Redman and Martyn Fotheringham from Peterhead and Forfar Athletic respectively also look particularly astute and they will be hoping to improve on their 4th place finish this season. Petrie suffered a testing pre-season and at the time of writing no less than nine first team players are recovering from various injuries. As a consequence they have already been knocked out of the League Cup, conceding 15 goals in just four matches, and the sooner their injured players are back the better if Montrose are to fulfil their potential this season.