New signing Tom Leighton believes Cove Rangers provide him with the perfect platform to further his career.
The defender got off to a winning start with the League 2 leaders, making his debut in Saturday’s success against Stenhousemuir at the Balmoral Stadium.
The 19-year-old Northern Ireland under-19 international left Premier League Watford in the summer, but says Cove will provide him with what he needs to improve.
Leighton said: “I hope as a club we can win the league and personally I hope I can get a lot of senior games under my belt because that is only going to improve me as a player.
“These are the games I need. I experienced Premier League development football at Watford, I’ve come through a youth academy and I’ve played age groups with Northern Ireland.
“All I need now is senior games and that’s what I’m going to get at Cove so it’s a good opportunity.
“I know the assistant manager Gordon Young from my time at Motherwell. He offered me the chance to come and play senior football and that’s why I’ve joined.
“At Motherwell Gordon was always good to me. On Saturday he said I was in the team because he believed in me and that’s a great confidence booster before your debut.
“The manager is impressive as well and he has so much experience in the game.
“It’s an ambitious club with targets and it allows myself to set targets which is good.”
On his debut, Leighton added: “It was good to make my debut and I really enjoyed the game and it was good to get the win as well.”
Cove started strongly against struggling Stenny, but didn’t get the first half lead their dominance deserved.
Fraser Aird had their two best efforts – the first a free-kick from 25 yards which hit the crossbar – and the second a dinked shot blocked by visiting goalkeeper Graeme Smith after the Canadian had burst through.
The breakthrough came eight minutes after the interval when Scott Ross drove forward from defence and found Martin Scott, he played in Mitch Megginson and when Smith parried the captain’s strike Scott turned in the rebound.
The Warriors responded on 64 minutes when Alan Cook’s cross from the left set up Jonathan Tiffoney to drill into the top left corner.
Cove resumed their dominance thereafter with the visitors reduced to 10 men 10 minutes from time as David Hopkirk picked up a second booking from referee David Lowe for catching Jamie Masson with a sliding challenge.
And the Aberdeen team claimed the points in the 87th when substitute John Robertson – who had only been on five minutes – sent a terrific shot into the top left corner from the right angle of the area.
On the performance of Robertson and Leighton, Cove manager Paul Hartley said: “When you put a sub on they have to make an impact and John did that. We wanted to win and we got the players forward to do it. John is only a kid at 17, but he has quality. It’s a brilliant finish.
“Tom had a good debut after not playing for a while he started to get cramp towards the end. He’s a good athlete who can play across the back four.”