Confidence ahead of Fife's Rovers return

Anton Dowds muscles his way through the Forfar defence.

Both East Fife and Raith Rovers notched up victories at the weekend, meaning the gap between the second and third sides in League One remains at six points.

Raith hold that advantage over East Fife despite having failed to beat them in the two matches already played this campaign.

And boss Darren Young is keen to keep that record intact going into the New Year.

He said: “They’ll be looking for a bit of revenge after the defeat at Bayview.

“So we know it’ll be a hard game and they have a few players back now from the last time.

“We’re not going to kid ourselves on, it’ll be a hard match there.

“But we’ll go with confidence now after going three games unbeaten, a good victory on Saturday and five points clear in third place.”

The Fifers made it back to back wins at Bayview on Saturday, seeing off Forfar 1-0.

There was a pressure attached to the game with the Loons knowing a win would take them into third sport and knock East Fife down.

But the Methil men stood up to the challenge well, were strong in defence and took their chance when it came along, Scott Agnew netting with six minutes left.

“Everybody played their part,” said the manager.

“We had the three guys to come on off the bench and having that option was great.

“We spoke about getting 13 or 14 points per-quarter and got 16 in the first and 13 now.

“We’re on target and the players are giving us what we’re asking from.

“It’s a real good squad and they’re all sticking together.”