Just No Luck

Falkirk have managed to complete the re-signing of  Pedro Moutinho to have him in contention for a place in the side to face Celtic today. The Bairns had a verbal agreement with the Portuguese forward for him to stay until January but they had to wait to receive confirmation that a contract dispute with former club CS Maritimo had been resolved. Moutinho spent four seasons before returning to his homeland in the summer of last year but is back for now. He said: "It is great to be back with Falkirk and I would like to thank the club staff, who worked so hard behind the scenes to make this possible. I am now really looking forward to the game against Celtic on Sunday."

That appears to be the only bit of good news for manager Eddie May ahead of today's game as Falkirk have suffered some bad injury news. Kjartan Finnbogason, Jackie McNamara and Burton O'Brien are all facing time on the sidelines. McNamara has been ruled out for six weeks with a knee ligament injury and O'Brien, who missed last week's defeat at St Johnstone with a stomach muscle strain, is out for eight weeks. Finnbogason faces three weeks out with a knee injury, while Thomas Scobbie (pubis) remains on the injury list.

Chairman Martin Ritchie knows that he will have to check his bank balance as May needs investment as he attempts to spark a revival in Falkirk's fortunes and get them off the bottom of the league. The economic climate being suffered at the moment means that May will not be unrealistic in his demands. May said: "You can't be selfish. Well, I could be selfish and say 'if I don't get this money we are not going to be any good as a football team'. It could cost me my job, it probably would. But the most important thing is Falkirk develop, keep in business and don't put the business at risk. If I go in and ask for a million pounds I could then keep Falkirk in the Premier League but it would be no use because we would then be out of business. There is a balance to be had and I can't dictate that. The only people that can dictate that are the guys who do the accounts and the board. The board will then instruct me there is X amount of money there and then it's up to me to get appropriate players in. I think we need a few players in and, if we can get them, we will be better for it. If we can't, we can't do anything about it."

Celtic captain Stephen McManus is back from suspension and could be back for the game. The defender missed out on last week's win over Kilmarnock but returns to travel to the Falkirk Stadium before serving a second game ban when the domestic action resumes after the international break. Midfielders Scott Brown and Shaun Maloney both remain on the sidelines with an ankle injury and tendonitis respectively. Defender Gary Caldwell is hoping his side can get their season back on track today. The Scotland defender said: "We have left ourselves with a lot to do because of the bad start to the Europa League campaign but anything is possible in football. I think we can take a lot of heart from the performance against Hamburg, there are obviously areas where we need to be better but we have to build on the performance. We created better chances on the night than they did although they were better than us on the ball and probably had more of the game. But if you miss chances it's going to cost you. However, we will keep working at it and now we have to put it behind us for Falkirk. We understand that playing in Europe is tough but we have to recover and come out again fighting on Sunday. We've done that over the last few years and we know what it takes but Falkirk will be a tough game."