And co-gaffers Scott Smith and Willie Patterson later breathed a sigh of relief after hearing their players had come through without any ill-effects.

Stevie O'Keane, Sean McKenna and former St Rochs winger David Galt were on target in a 3-0 win.

Smith said: "We set up the game to retain our playing edge, but sometimes the motivation is missing for friendly matches.

"But the guys turned in a much better second half performance."

A notable absentee from the veritable array of Peasy players trotted out in the 90 minutes work-out was recovering-from-injury full-back Craig Palmer and it was confirmed he will not feature in the Beechwood Park showdown against the Ayrshire cracks.

Meanwhile, word on the home team front is that broken-foot victim Martin McGoldrick is a definite non-starter for Auchinleck whose manager Tommy Sloan is in the pleasant position of having Scotland Juniors stopper Gavin Collins waiting in the wings as a replacement.

A more difficult call for Tucker is whether to restore fit-again Gordon Pope or keep faith in Ally Park who has been a revelation deputising on the left side of Talbot's defence.