Daryll Meggatt admits it was a tough season for Darvel – but says it was all worth it after lifting the West of Scotland Premier Division title.
The ‘Vale captain celebrated with his side as they pipped Auchinleck Talbot to the trophy – and now they are getting set for a play-off against Tranent which could see them promoted to the Lowland League.
Meggatt has been a rock in the East Ayrshire side’s defence all season, and he is just glad a gruelling season is almost over.
He told the Kilmarnock Standard: “We were delighted with winning the league, we were able to enjoy ourselves after the Kilwinning game.
“It has been a long, hard season, it has been tough.
“But I have mates who have played in the Juniors, and they say every season you’re catching up with games.
“Four games a week would be hard for any team at any level, but all we could do was take it one game at a time, take three points.”
He added: “We knew there would be twists and turns, and there was, but it obviously fell in our favour.
“I think we showed great resilience in those games, we got there in the end.
“We always had that belief, we were 21 points behind at one point but we had all those games in hand.
“I look at the Troon game, we were 2-0 down and down to 10 men, it would have been easy to crumble, but we got bodies up the park and went for it and we won the game.
“I think that was the turning point in the run in, that put a wee bit of extra pressure on Auchinleck and gave us a lift.”
Meggatt has heaped praise on his gaffer Michael Kennedy – and Darvel chairman John Gall for backing him.
He said: “Mick deserves great praise, he has went and drawn up a plan, he’s stuck to it and it’s working so far.
“I have great praise for him, and the club too for backing him, that’s massive.
“You need backing if you are going to go and do something, you can’t do it on shoestrings, we got there in the end and we will now look at hopefully getting promoted.”
He added: “Everyone is a leader in that dressing room, everyone will pull someone through if they’re having a bad time.
“Everyone in there knows they can turn to anyone if it’s not going there way.
“There is a lot of leaders across the club, from the players to the coaches to the kitman.
“We all try and push players, and it shows when you see how we do.”
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