Reaction

Yesterday was another day which has been typical of Alloa Athletic’s season this term, going into the game Raith Rovers were huge favourites and in the past John McGlynn has been always maintained Alloa never open up at Starks Park. Yesterday was to be different, Alloa went and looked to take the game to the home side, giving themselves every chance of at least taking a point. In the opening minute Marvin Andrews, who could easily have been named man of the match, flattened Any Scott and this set the tone for the first half in which we had five bookings and one red card. Alloa nearly took the lead in bizarre fashion went Dougie Wilson’s shot bounced in front and over the home keeper, only for him to scoop it back off the line. There seemed no danger to the visitors when a long ball was played towards the front, left of the box, but keeper Jellema and defender both hesitated and Campbell then played a ball across the front of the box straight to Kevin Smith, a gift out of nothing. Twelve minutes later Raith Rovers were reduced to ten men when Stephen Simmons caught Dougie Wilson late and he was red carded, having already having received a previous booking for foul on Pat Scullion. Dougie Wilson had to spend the evening in hospital in Kirkcaldy, where it was discovered he had a double fracture to his ankle, which will keep him out for the rest of the season. Alloa battled back and in the second half Brown Ferguson scored with a free kick after Andy Scott had been fouled. At this stage in the game a confident side would have went on and collected all three points but Alloa’s inability this season to hold on to a game appeared again. Five minutes after Alloa had equalised Marvin Andrews crossed for Kevin Smith to score his second goal of the game. Although Alloa still had numerical advantage it was the home side who looked the more dangerous in front of goal and in the final minute Alloa were again caught on the break and Graham Weir sent a chip over the head of keeper Jellema who was caught in no mans land off his line. The scoreline was cruel on Alloa but again they had not been able to finish out a game in which they could easily have collected at least a point. Next week the team travel to Methil to face East Fife in another game which is now crucial the team pick up points.

allan maitland after raith game

Every Saturday at the moment we are finding new ways to lose games, we found a way at Brechin where we played a game for 90 minutes, when concentrations levels were good and out of the blue we threw away a goal and then today, for the first goal again, a long ball, a nothing ball, our defender can’t deal with it and decides not only that he can’t deal with it but he will probably make it a little bit easier for them by squaring it and allowing them to tap it into an empty net, so that puts all your plans out the window. We’ve got a plan in force, I know John McGlynn believes when we come to Starks Park we park a bus in front of the goal, but we didn’t do that today. We came here today with a middle four, ahead of Scot Buist to go and attack and try and squeeze the game and at the beginning of the game I thought that was working really well for us. I think to be fair to the referee there wasn’t much in the bookings he could do anything about, I don’t think he had much choice in the sending off – the players were making it difficult for the referee. When Raith Rovers went down to ten men we worked really hard, done the right things, stretched the game as much as possible, scored what I thought was a good goal, but a poor goal for Raith Rovers and then inexplicably allowed them to have encouragement and I have to give them credit I thought their work rate and in the way they played in the second half was fantastic with ten men but they didn’t need any encouragement, this is Raith Rovers who are fighting to win the league, but we gave them encouragement by giving them cheap corner kicks and then allowing them to cross balls into our box when they should have been shut down quicker. The third goal was just a kick up the park – we couldn’t deal with. We are where we are because we are incapable of dealing with defending properly for 90 minutes. We are very much aware of the fact that we are in a relegation struggle now and a relegation fight, I have been saying that for weeks and weeks despite how well we play at times we still manage to lose games – today was a game having got back to one each a point was the minimum we should have expected from the game, instead of kicking on and taking encouragement from the goal, what we did is we stood off Raith Rovers and allowed them to come to us. They deserved their win, I thought they were better than us despite going down to ten men and we have nobody to blame but ourselves.