Third away Fife derby defeat on spin for Raith Rovers
Raith Rovers were hit by their third derby defeat away to Dunfermline Athletic on Friday, ending a four-match winless run for their fellow Fifers.
That 2-0 loss at East End Park in front of a crowd of 6,753, including 1,236 disappointed away fans, followed one by the same scoreline last September and another by 3-1 in February, though Raith have won all three reverse fixtures in Kirkcaldy in the interim, all by 2-0 too, in August, March and last December.
It was also the Stark’s Park’s club’s third 2-0 beating on the spin after ones hosting Ayr United six days earlier and away to Ross County seven days before that.
On-loan Falkirk striker Barney Stewart put manager Neil Lennon’s Pars ahead with an overhead kick past visiting No 1 Josh Rae on 19 minutes, from a Jeremiah Chilokoa-Mullen assist following a Keith Bray corner, and Chris Kane put the game beyond Rovers’ reach with a second goal on 79.
Raith skipper Scott Brown, at the centre of a five-man midfield in a three-five-two formation, hit the crossbar with a shot from distance and Ross Matthews and Dylan Easton registered efforts on target but the visitors weren’t able to find a way past home goalkeeper Billy Terrell.
Raith’s two shots on target and six all together were outnumbered by six on and and a further five off for their hosts, though the two teams enjoyed equal shares of possession.
Friday’s result leaves gaffer Barry Robson’s team fifth in the William Hill Championship table, on 14 points from 11 fixtures, one place and two points better off than Dunfermline, having played a game more, as well as being ten behind table-topping St Johnstone.
Robson blamed a lack of creativity for his side’s latest defeat, telling Raith TV afterwards: “For a lot of the game, they just sat in and waited for us to break them down and tried to hit us on the counter-attack. That was down to us and we need to be better, to create more and score goals against them.
“It was a story of us huffing and puffing, a bit like last week, trying to make things happen, trying to make things work, trying to get in more dangerous areas, and it’s really difficult when a team are sitting in like that because they’re a goal up.
“That’s something we need to be better at. We need to be more creative in the final third.”
The 46-year-old is also unhappy about his side’s failure to take advantage when opportunity knocks and to shut out opponents, saying: “What we need to do is make sure that our set-plays are better and we need to make sure that when we do get opportunities, we’ve got to try and take them.
“We’re not scoring goals at the minute, so we’ve got to try and keep clean sheets. We’re getting punished for everything at the moment, but it’s only us that can get us out of that. We’ve got to be strong mentally.
“We’ve got to get back to trying to keep clean sheets.”
Next up for Rovers is a visit from Partick Thistle this coming Saturday, with kick-off at Stark’s Park at 3pm, and their Glaswegian visitors, second in the table on 21 points from ten fixtures, will arrive on the back of a 1-0 win at home to Ross County at the weekend.