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Viaplay Cup seedings confirmed – who do you want in your team’s group?

Ross County are among the top seeds for Thursday's draw.

By Danny Law

June 7 2023, 3:31 pm

Celtic's Callum McGregor lifts the Viaplay Cup. Imge: SNS.

The SPFL has confirmed the seeding pots for the 2023-24 Viaplay Cup group stage draw.

The draw takes place on Thursday at 1pm and will be shown live by Viaplay Sports on Viaplay Xtra.

The draw will also be made available on the Viaplay YouTube channel and Viaplay Twitter page. It can also be watched live on the SPFL YouTube channel.

Aberdeen and the other four SPFL clubs who are taking part in European competition (Celtic, Rangers, Hearts and Hibernian) receive a bye to the knockout stages of the competition.

The group stage draw will involve the remaining 37 SPFL clubs from 2022/23, plus Highland League champions Brechin City and Lowland League champions The Spartans, who won promotion to the SPFL last month.

Cowdenbeath, who were relegated from cinch League 2 in 2022, have accepted an invitation to take the remaining space in this year’s first round group stage.

As was the case last season, there is no regionalised aspect to the group stage draw.

The 40 participating clubs will be split into five seeding pots based on final league placings in season 2022/23. One club from each pot will be drawn into the eight Groups A-H.

Seeding pots and club numbers

Pot 1

1 St Mirren

2 Motherwell

3 Livingston

4 St Johnstone

5 Kilmarnock

6 Ross County

7 Dundee United

8 Dundee

Pot 2

9 Ayr United

10 Queen’s Park

11 Partick Thistle

12 Greenock Morton

13 Inverness Caledonian Thistle

14 Raith Rovers

15 Arbroath

16 Hamilton Academical

Pot 3

17 Cove Rangers

18 Dunfermline Athletic

19 Falkirk

20 Airdrieonians

21 Alloa Athletic

22 Queen of the South

23 FC Edinburgh

24 Montrose

Pot 4

25 Kelty Hearts

26 Clyde

27 Peterhead

28 Stirling Albion

29 Dumbarton

30 Annan Athletic

31 East Fife

32 Forfar Athletic

Pot 5

33 Stenhousemuir

34 Stranraer

35 Bonnyrigg Rose

36 Elgin City

37 Albion Rovers

38 Brechin City

39 The Spartans

40 Cowdenbeath

The competition begins on the weekend of July 15-16, with further matchdays on July 18-19, July 22-23, July 25-26 and July 29-30.

The eight group winners and three best runners-up will join European entrants Celtic, Rangers, Aberdeen, Heart of Midlothian and Hibernian in the last 16 of the competition on the weekend of August 19-20.

The SPFL has confirmed the seeding pots for the 23/24 #ViaplayCup Group Stage Draw, which takes place on Thursday, June 8 at 1pm.

You can watch live on @ViaplaySportsUK Xtra or on our YouTube channel.

— SPFL (@spfl) June 7, 2023