Young Kirriemuir girls are playing out a Disney dream with a football at their feet.
They are the first Angus participants in a Uefa scheme aimed at encouraging five to eight-year-olds to fall in love with football through the magic of a Disney storytelling.
Kirrie Thistle scooped the honour of securing the Playmakers programme through the Scottish Football Association in a coup for the community outfit.
It might see Elastigirl or Edna Mode being the early inspiration for the nation’s next Kim Little, one of the all-time greats of the Scottish women’s game.
Club development officer Mark Nisbet said the scheme is off to a fairytale start.
“The SFA got in contact with us and a number of clubs to see if we would be interested and had the capability to deliver the programme,” said Mark.
“To be given this brand new programme with the Uefa and Disney ties is quite a prestigious thing for us as a club.”
Mark continued: “It’s quite unique – although it’s surrounding football, the programme is more about storytelling and creative play.
“It’s also about breaking down barriers.
“It helps the girls make friends, build confidence and learn new skills for football and life.”
Saturday morning sessions
The primary-aged youngsters take on the roles of favourite Disney characters during the hour-long Saturday morning sessions at Webster’s sports centre.
Mark added: “The kids set up the sessions, there’s a storybook that they use to play out some of their favourite scenes and they have a lot of fun.
“We’ve capacity for 30 children and for the very first session we had around half that number.
“For something brand new that’s never been done before I think we were pretty happy with that.
“The early feedback from parents has been really good so I hope we will see the numbers grow to take us up to capacity.”
The programme will run in three ten week blocks, with Frozen 2 and 2016 hit animation Moana the next movies which the girls will tackle in the play programme.
It’s also another step along the road for Kirrie Thistle’s ambitions to develop their wider ambitions.
Mark added: “We are in the process of putting together a development plan which we hope will encompass a lot of the community and this is just a part of that.”