By Jack Cranmer

As the first stage of the newly reworked Scottish Challenge Cup – now rebranded as the KDM Evolution Trophy – draws to a close, it feels like the appropriate moment to assess what has changed, and what the early returns suggest.

The competition has been remodelled to echo UEFA’s European formats, with a six-game league phase replacing the previous straight knockout approach.

Touted as an “exciting new era” and aimed at “pushing new talent towards stardom,” by the SPFL, the competition has lost its unique selling point. Supporters are frustrated. Managers are overwhelmed. Schedules are packed.

The founding fathers of football, Scotland now find themselves once again copying the trends of others by introducing this watered-down version of another trophy.

Tony Asghar once called us “the game of clones” and asked the question: “Why does Scottish Football continue to copy the culture of other countries without having our own?” and this rings true with this convoluted revamp.

The tournament remains ring-fenced for clubs outside the Premiership, but this year’s structure represents a significant shift.

The 20 sides from Leagues 1 and 2 entered the league phase alongside ten Premiership B teams.

Their involvement is familiar by now – this is the ninth season since B sides were first introduced in 2016/17.

Now the combination of a longer schedule and growing scrutiny of their role in the lower tiers has made their performance harder to ignore.

The competition now seems to be aimed more at youth development for clubs at the top level than a chance for the sides in the lower reaches to have their own moment of glory

Of the 30 clubs in the league stage, 22 will progress to the second round, where the Championship sides join the draw. Yet heading into the sixth and final matchday, only B teams look set to fall short.

Rangers, Dundee and Kilmarnock have already been eliminated, and only Stirling Albion – currently sandwiched between Celtic and Hibernian in 21st place – stops the entire bottom ten from being occupied by B sides.

Rangers youngster Oliver Hynd said he and his teammates “learn from” the defeats and it lets them “know where we need to improve,” but it is not a matter of improvement – these are teenage boys going up against fully developed men who physically bully them on the park and defeating them every week – adding mental anguish to the physical bruise.

The numbers do not wholly settle the debate around their presence in senior competition, but they do underline the competitive gap and sets the stage for questioning of their merit in a tournament that once gave hope for lower league sides to see silverware during the season.

For a format designed to foster development and meaningful minutes, the early evidence suggests that the B teams at this level, are nothing more than whipping boys and this could be doing more harm to the young lads mentally than good technically.

And for a national who is rate development highly enough to shoehorn these sides into major contests we do not help foster development from grass roots, as Scottish businessman Bob Welsh put it: “Facilities. We don’t have enough football pitches including indoors.

“When I was a kid, I had a pick of pitches at Glasgow green etc.

“You did not have to book anything to have a game you just turned up with a ball.

“It is becoming a middle-class sport with parents being priced out of having their kids play.”

Surely, if development is so important to the SFA – they will put their funding and effort into the first steps rather than unneeded and unwanted changes to the established men’s system.

There is also the added pressure on these lower league sides with the extra fixtures – most teams at this level are part-time and their players, coaching staff and club officials have other commitments, and with more midweek games comes added time off, early finishes and ultimately tightening of personal schedules.

The last time the tournament was expanded it was to include sides from Northern Ireland and Wales – which gave these lower league supporters who would otherwise never experience far flung away games like those higher up the food chain would experience in Europe, a chance for rare jaunts to new locations – but now all they are provided with is extra home games against kids on cold, wet Tuesday evenings.

Whilst most managers of these clubs will publicly say it is a good chance to try different systems or rotate in players needing game time privately it is a different story.

They will bemoan the fixture pileup, the lack of crowd interest with such a low threshold for qualification and the anti-B team boycotts many lower league fans partake in and the fact that it takes over nights usually pencilled in for training which is already limited at part time level.

Inverness CT manager Scott Kellecher did make comment on the new format early in the season branding it “ridiculous.”

While speaking to the Press & Journal he said: “I think it’s ridiculous, the amount of games they [The SPFL] are expecting teams to play.

“It’s not just us, it affects a lot of other teams as well. It’s a lot of games to fit in.

“They have thrown six (first-round) games in.

“Last year, you win a game and go through, if you lose, then you’re out and you concentrate on the league.

“I’d be surprised if I’m the only one feeling like that.

“We’re trying to get quality on the pitch, and we’re trying to get fans back to watch games.

“You want to be excited when you come to games.”

The B-team coaches are understandably more positive on the new setup which gives their young players experience of playing against full men’s teams in a competitive environment.

When I interviewed Rangers B team coach Stevie Smith he said: “It’s critical for the lads development.

We’re putting young players into that environment quicker than in previous years, and of course we’ll suffer a bit because of that.

“But it’s about giving them exposure to men’s football, and while we’re frustrated with results, we also need to recognise the long-term aim is producing first-team players.”

But in truth, the tournament now feels caught between two identities and satisfies neither side.

What once offered lower-league clubs a rare opportunity for prestige, momentum and memories has become a development lab with the illusion of competitiveness.

The removal of any real jeopardy, the dreary repetition of fixtures and the growing sense that the games matter more to the training schedules of elite academies than the ambitions of League 1 and 2 sides has dulled the entire enterprise.

Supporters can feel it, managers are thinking it, and the table itself is spelling it out in numbers more clearly than any argument could.

If the Challenge Cup is to mean anything again, it must rediscover what made it worthwhile in the first place: scarcity, romance, and the chance for the overlooked and underappreciated to shine.

Right now, it looks like a tournament losing its soul – and unless the SPFL is willing to listen to those who attend the games, it may soon lose the people who once cared enough to fight for it.