East Stirlingshire face expulsion from the Scottish Cup after fielding an ineligible player in their fourth-round win over Buckie Thistle.
Falkirk goalkeeper Michael Andrews played in last week's 1-0 victory for Shire despite the registration documents for his loan extension failing to appear at Hampden.
The Irn-Bru Third Division club insist they sent the papers to the Scottish Football Association and Scottish Football League before Christmas, but they face being automatically expelled from the competition - and missing out on a home fifth-round tie against Brechin - under the SFA's recently-tightened rules.
An emergency meeting has been convened for Thursday afternoon where the SFA board members will decide the club's fate.
Andrews, 20, signed for Shire in the summer in a loan deal that expired on January 3.
Neither governing body received the updated registration papers but he appeared for the club in their 2-0 league win over Clyde on January 15 and their cup win four days later.
However, club chairman Les Thomson told Press Association Sport that they had sent the paperwork in December.
"All the documentation was sent through on the 21st," Thomson said. "It is nothing to do with the SFA and ourselves, it's the middle man who delivers the documents. They were put in the post as we normally do.
"Everybody knows what happened at Christmas time - there was a backlog of mail. Some of it reached its destination, some of it didn't. We have acted 100% correctly as far as we are concerned. Both Falkirk and myself sorted the paperwork."
However, the SFA passed a resolution at their AGM in May automatically expelling clubs who field ineligible players in the competition.
Source: PA
