Ayr United pair land October League One Manager and Player of the Month
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Ayr United are celebrating a double after scooping the Ladbrokes League One Manager and Player of the month awards for October.
Boss Ian McCall and striker Michel Moffat have come out on top after a great spell for the Honest Men that has taken them joint top of the Ladbrokes League One table.
United collected seven points from three games in an unbeaten October. The highlight was a 5-0 win away at Forfar Athletic.
Moffat smashed through the 100 career goals barrier during the month – but McCall won’t be completely satisfied until he hits the ton for Ayr and is tipping him to do it.
The Somerset Park boss said: “I don’t know if the 100 goals thing was playing on his mind but he went off the boil for four or five games.
“But he’s been excellent in the last two or three and also in training where he has been right back on it.
“He’s a very good footballer and certainly good enough to play in the Championship which hopefully he will do with us next season.
“It’s great that he broke through the 100 career goals but I think it will be a time to celebrate when he gets 100 goals for us because included in the 103 he has scored are two against us.
“So I wasn’t celebrating that much, I’ll celebrate when he scores them all for Ayr and hopefully he will get there in the next year or so.
“I think he needs 23 or 24 so he’s getting close which is a good effort considering he didn’t start playing senior football until he was 25 or 26.”
Moffat admits the goals target had been playing on his mind but he believes Ayr are in great shape and ready to deliver a title party for the fans.
He said: “It’s been a great month for me because I reached the 100-goal mark in the Forfar game when I scored a hat-trick.
“I was just glad that it came eventually and now I’m targeting getting into the top 10 of all-time Ayr scorers. I think I need about eight or nine more to get there so that would be really good.
“It’s great to be back level with Raith because they were getting away a wee bit.
“When we have a full-strength squad, we are a match for anyone in the league.
“I’m loving being back at Ayr and I feel we have great potential so hopefully we can give the fans a league title to celebrate.”
McCall reckons the awards reflects how well the team has done in recent weeks.
He said: “I think I have over 20 of these going back to three in a row in my first job at Clydebank and my mum’s got them all!
“Everybody says it, but it’s recognition for all the staff and all the players that they have done well over the month.
“But at the back of your mind you know you don’t win anything in football in one month. You get your tangible rewards at the end of a season.
“If you include the last day of September we’ve had five games and we’ve won four and drawn one and we’ve scored more than 15 goals and kept four clean sheets.
“The players have done very well and it has coincided with us having a full squad available again.
“It means the bench is a lot stronger and that was really typified last week against Stranraer when I was able to change two players and the shape of the team.
“We have got ourselves into a good position and I think it shows that at our best we can hold our own against anyone.”
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.
