Dunfermline's Matty Todd says side must be 'wary' of Edinburgh City

But the influential midfielder is hopeful that work on the training pitch to sharpen up their finishing will pay off at Meadowbank Stadium and move them in to Monday's fourth round draw.

Dunfermline make the short hop across the Queensferry Crossing as they enter the competition at the third round stage, and will renew acquaintances with a Citizens outfit they met during their triumphant League One season of 2022/23.

The Pars won three, and drew one, of the four meetings between the clubs, including both in Edinburgh, but, in the following campaign, City were relegated to League Two.

They're currently fifth in the fourth tier and, with Athletic having experienced defeats to Forfar Athletic, of the same division, and Cove Rangers, of League One, in the League Cup earlier this season, Todd is exercising caution going into the game.

"I think we’ve got to be wary, no matter the opponent," he said.

"We’ve had that before, obviously, if you look at the cup results in the Premier Sports Cup. We played a couple of lower league sides there and struggled with results.

"We’ve got to listen to the manager’s game plan and look forward to the game on Saturday. Hopefully we get through to the next round of the cup.

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"As a team, we’ve been creating many good chances. It’s just 'when will that goal come'? We’ll hopefully go and score a couple more. That’s probably what the boys need. With a wee bit of confidence we can go and knock a few past teams.

"We’ll score goals but, with the chances we’re creating, we probably should be scoring more. We’ve been working on that in training and the manager and the coaching staff have been great.

Matty Todd is hopeful that the Pars will find their shooting boots in the capital. (Image: Craig Brown.) "They’ve put on sessions that have tried to get us to take the big chances and the big moments in games. A lot of shooting, a lot of crossing and finishing.

"We’ll take that into the weekend and take it into future Championship games as well."

Todd and his Pars pals fell to defeat in their last outing, at Ayr United, on an afternoon where their journey to Somerset Park took more than five hours due to Storm Bert.

Despite only arriving at the ground at 2.50pm, a revised kick off time of 3.45pm was set, and Jay Henderson's second half goal gave the hosts a one-goal victory.

"We’ve rectified that in training and gone over the video this week to analyse what we can do better over the course of the game to help each other out," Todd continued.

"We’ve tried to see the points where boys can show for the ball a wee bit better and maybe take care of the ball and look after it a wee bit better. That’s the focus on this week and we’re just trying to take that into Saturday’s game and try to get back to winning ways. Even in the future games, we want to get better and better at that.

"It’s a good one to try and get through to the next round of the Scottish Cup - everyone wants to progress to as far a stage as possible. As the manager has shown in his team selections, no matter if it be the Premier Sports Cup or the SPFL Trust Trophy, the manager has always gone with a strong team.

"It’ll be no different this weekend."