East Fife aiming to avoid Spiders' web

Young’s bottom of the division Fifers head west to meet the league leaders at Partick Thistle’s Firhill Stadium on Saturday.

East Fife laboured through the first quarter of the season, but one positive was an opening day draw against the Spiders.

After that, the two took different paths, Queen’s rising up the table and East Fife sinking to the bottom.

But Young’s side are showing signs of recovery and have taken six points from a possible nine this quarter.

The return to the side of some key players has certainly had an impact and Young believes they can continue their resurgence on Saturday.

He said: “We’ll go there as underdogs but we showed in the first game that we could more than match them and cope with them.

"We maybe got a bit lucky at times but, at the same time, I felt we could have been another couple of goals up before they came back.

“Kevin Smith has had one and Sean Brown was through just before half-time.

"Saturday will be a fight, it’ll be a scrap for the full game, and we know what to expect.

"They’re probably the favourites for the title and, from our own point of view, we may not have as much possession as we’ve had in the past few games.

"They have players who are capable of hurting teams but it’s 11 v 11 so it’s up to our guys to go out there and take the opportunities when they arrive.”

Despite Saturday’s 2-1 victory over Dumbarton, East Fife remain at the bottom of the division.

But they’ve been steadily cutting that gap between themselves and those above them and may get off the foot this weekend should results go their way.

"We’re not worrying about the other end of the table whatsoever right now,” added Young.

"It’s all hands to the pump to get as many points as we can and catch the team in front.

"Credit to the boys, we’ve taken six points from nine this quarter which is a good start for us.”

Saturday’s game is expected to come too quickly for injured players Ross Dunlop, Ross Davidson and Aaron Dunsmore.