​Late Livingston winner denies Raith Rovers their first point on road of new William Hill Championship football season

Even halting a three-year losing streak against the West Lothian outfit proved to be beyond them as though they made it beyond the 90-minute mark tied at 1-1, a header by former Scotland international Danny Wilson quarter of an hour prior having cancelled out the 21st-minute goal from a Sam Stanton assist that gave the Fifers the lead for over half the fixture, they weren’t able to hold out until the end of six minutes’ stoppage time, losing 2-1.

Centre-back Wilson, 32, was sent off two minutes into injury time but that late levelling-up in numbers wasn’t enough to enable Rovers to keep their hosts at bay until the final whistle as fellow ex-Blackpool defender Michael Nottingham came up with a winner, from a Reece McAlear corner, three minutes later.

Visiting manager Neill Collins was disappointed to see his side suffer their sixth defeat of the new William Hill Championship football season, extending their failure to pick up any points on the road to five fixtures, telling Raith TV afterwards: “With respect to their late goal from a set-piece, we’ve definitely got a big issue there and it’s one that we will address moving forward. That’s definitely what I’m most frustrated about.

“For all the positives, for all the things that were maybe out of our control, we lost two goals that I think, whether we had 11 or ten men on the park, we needed to do a lot better with.”

Collins, 41, was also unhappy about the two yellow cards shown to Dick in the space of five minutes by referee Ross Hardie, leading to his dismissal and leaving the visitors outnumbered for almost half the game, saying: “There’s two sides to it. There’s a side that we can control, and that’s the side we will work on, and then there’s a side that’s outwith our control in terms of some of the decisions we’ve faced.

“We’ve maybe got an issue with some of the decision-making against us.

“They were two really soft yellow cards. I think the first one was incredible. We were anything but timewasting. We were starting the second half with the sole intention of going out to try to win while we were still 1-0 up.

“All through the second half, our players were doing everything to try to come away with three points or at the very least a point.

“We’ve got a good team of good players and they’re giving everything that you’d want for the badge.”

Livingston: Jerome Prior, Matthew Clarke, Ryan McGowan, Michael Nottingham, Danny Wilson, Scott Pittman, Stephen Kelly, Jamie Brandon, Tete Yengi, Stevie May, Robbie Muirhead. Subs: Reece McAlear, Liam Sole, Marcelo Pitaluga, Lewis Smith, Andy Winter, Oliver Green, Daniel Finlayson, Andrew Shinnie, Samson Lawal

Raith: Kevin Dabrowski, Liam Dick, Paul Hanlon, Callum Fordyce, Fankaty Dabo, Samuel Stanton, Finlay Pollock, Scott Brown, Shaun Byrne, Lewis Jamieson, Jack Hamilton. Subs: Aidan Connolly, Ross Matthews, Callum Smith, Andrew McNeil, Josh Mullin, Lewis Gibson, Kai Montagu, Lewis Stevenson, Korede David