{"id":32753,"date":"2026-07-26T17:02:28","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T17:02:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/holders-st-mirren-visit-rangers-in-league-cup-last-16\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T17:02:28","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T17:02:28","slug":"holders-st-mirren-visit-rangers-in-league-cup-last-16","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/holders-st-mirren-visit-rangers-in-league-cup-last-16\/","title":{"rendered":"Holders St Mirren visit Rangers in League Cup last 16"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Dunfermline were the last side to qualify for the last 16 when a late Chris Kane penalty secured a win away to St Mirren on Sunday that sealed progress as one of the three best runners-up at Championship rivals Queen&#8217;s Park&#8217;s expense.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Although St Mirren still topped the group on goal difference, the defeat meant they missed out on being seeded in Sunday&#8217;s draw. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Reacting to being drawn away to Rangers, manager Craig McLeish said: &#8220;I am disappointed from my point of view that we had a chance to win our group and be one of the seeded sides and the draw has not been good to us.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I thought we were denied a goal, but we only have ourselves to blame unfortunately.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Dunfermline head coach Neil Lennon was a happier man.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I thought we played well in the last half hour and deserved our victory,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;A home tie is the most important thing, but Ross County have been phenomenal this season after a hugely disappointing relegation, so we will not be taking anything for granted.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Aberdeen, Ayr, Dundee United, Inverness Caledonian Thistle, Kilmarnock, County and Stenhousemuir were the other group winners, while Dundee and Partick Thistle progressed as runners-up.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Celtic, Heart of Midlothian, Hibernian, Motherwell and Rangers were given byes to the last 16 as they are representing Scotland in European competitions.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">While the Old Firm have been drawn against top-flight opponents, the other three take on Championship sides, with Hearts hosting Caley Thistle, Hibs at home to Partick Thistle and Motherwell away to Stenhousemuir.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The second-round ties will be played on the weekend of 15-16 August.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sport\/football\/articles\/cp87vyrgvzlo?at_medium=RSS&#038;at_campaign=rss\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dunfermline were the last side to qualify for the last 16 when a late Chris Kane penalty secured a win away to St Mirren on Sunday that sealed progress as one of the three best runners-up at Championship rivals Queen&#8217;s Park&#8217;s expense. Although St Mirren still topped the group on goal difference, the defeat meant [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32754,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32753"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32753\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32755,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32753\/revisions\/32755"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}