GAFFER Jason McCrindle insists there's no pressure on his young Swifts side going into Sunday's East of Scotland Qualifying Cup final and wants them to play with freedom.
And he hopes they'll show no fear when they kick off against Dunbar United in a bid to land an historic first senior trophy for the club.
McCrindle, who recently signed a two-year extension after taking charge in November, will be the first manager to lead Inverkeithing Hillfield Swifts into a cup final since they launched their senior team in 2018.
The match at New Victoria Park, Newtongrange, will be a memorable occasion for all involved and McCrindle is backing his squad to take it in their stride.
"If you've got a really experienced side, that have maybe been around the block a couple of times, they can maybe then use that, but these guys haven't," he explained to Press Sport.
"They won't really know what to expect in terms of the game, the pressure, and things like that.
"There's not really any pressure on them. We'll encourage them to go and play and just do what they do. They're young, they're free to go and play.
"I think, with young guys, you've just got to give them that freedom to go and express themselves. They're fearless, so I think that's probably the biggest thing, and we'll encourage them to do that."
In an impressive run to the final, the Swifts travelled to Lowland League Gala Fairydean Rovers in the last eight, knocking them out 3-2, before defeating their fellow East of Scotland League Premier Division side, and leaders, Broxburn Athletic, away from home in the semi-final.
"Nobody really gave us a hope against Gala," McCrindle recalled.
"We played Broxburn two weeks before the semi-final. Again, everybody thought we maybe got lucky in the first game, going 2-0 up (before losing 5-2 in a league match), but we went 2-0 up again.
"It's almost like the bigger the game, the better they are because young guys, they just thrive on that.
"So we hope they use that same mindset for the game as well.
"We'll speak with the players and we'll make them aware of what they've done, in terms of going and beating Gala, going and beating Broxburn, so we deserve to be here. We deserve to be in the final.
"I think we just need to go there, not to lose it, I think we go there to try and be positive to go and try and win it.
"You don't get many opportunities to get to finals, so we don't really want to go with any regrets, saying we'll go there and not get beat.
"You need to be clever with it as well, but we just need to make sure we go there to give ourselves the best opportunity to go and win the game, not to lose it."
The players are set to be treated to a pre-match breakfast ahead of the final, before they make their way to Midlothian, but McCrindle joked that the only other difference to their pre-match preparation would be that "I'll be a wearing a shirt and tie".
"It's a game. That's the focus, the game itself, rather than the occasion, what it is and what it means to everybody else," he added.
"It's what we do on the pitch and how I prepare the team because if we derail too much away from that, then they start thinking about other things.
"For me, everything will just be the same. You just want to encourage them to go and play the game with no regrets.
"You don't know when their next final will be. They'll be getting a lot of support from family and friends, so you've just got to put all that to the side and solely focus on the game."
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