Raith Rovers

V

Falkirk

Saturday 28th September

Stark’s Park

Kick off: 3.00pm

 

Admission Prices

Adults – £17

Parent & Child – £20

Concessions* – £9

Students* – £13

Under 6 – Free

*Concessions are under 16s, over 65s. Jobseekers and full time students can only be purchased as a concession from the main office at Stark’s Park. Jobseekers must show satisfactory proof of entitlement along with photographic I.D and students must show a valid 2013/14 matriculation card – expired student cards will not be accepted.

 Match officials

 Referee – John McKendrick

Assistants – Andy Tait and David Lowe

Observer – George Clyde

Mascot

Robbie Clark (7) from Capshard Primary School

Match Preview:  

It’s second versus third at Stark’s Park this weekend, as Raith Rovers entertain Falkirk, with both sides looking to build on impressive starts to their Championship campaigns.

Both teams on show were involved in high scoring league victories last weekend. Raith came out on top during a six-goal thriller against Alloa, while the Bairns put in arguably their best performance of the season against early promotion favourites Dundee, winning 3-1 at the Falkirk Stadium, thanks to a goal from Jay Fulton, and a double from Rory Loy.

This weeks fixture again has the potential for goals, with Falkirk’s strike force the most prolific in the Championship with eleven. Raith are only one behind however, and are joint second in the “Goals For” column, along with Hamilton and Dumbarton.

The two sides locked horns earlier this month, in the quarter-finals of the Ramsdens Cup, with Rovers progressing to the semi-finals thanks to a late Greig Spence strike. This helped maintain Rovers excellent recent record against Falkirk, who have only beaten Raith twice in their last ten encounters. Raith on the other hand have won on five of those occasions, with three games ending all-square.

 

What The Manger Said:

It’s been a productive start to the season for Raith Rovers. Not only are they sitting second in the Championship table, they also face Annan Athletic in the semi-finals of the Ramsdens Cup, and were unlucky to lose to Hearts in the League Cup. While manager Grant Murray had his fingers crossed for such a good start, he was aware that it was dependent on a few different factors,

“You’re always hopeful that you’ll start a new campaign well, as it can be key to a successful season, so I’m very happy with where we are right now. Of course, you always want more, whether you’re a player or a manager, but I think we can be reasonably satisfied with what we’ve done so far.”

“We made a lot of changes over the summer in terms of personnel, and we had to hope that they could all gel quickly, and thankfully they have. The guys that came in have been great, and the players we kept on have been fantastic as well, so all-in-all, we’re happy at this time.”

Raith have made a bit of a habit of hitting the ground running in the last few years, and last season saw the side make a similar early surge, only for their form to dip during the middle part of the season. With this new squad however, fans are hopeful that the current side can sustain the momentum,

“I feel exactly the same as them, I’m hoping we can too, and it’s obviously our intention, but we aren’t even a quarter of the way through the season, so we won’t be getting too far ahead of ourselves. There will be dips this season, every player has them, and so does every team, so there’s no doubt that at some point we’re going to find ourselves disappointed because of a game we’ve lost.”

“At the moment though, we’re going into games in a confident frame of mind, and that’s a great place to be. Not over-confident however, we’ll make sure we keep our feet on the ground, but we’re upbeat, and that’s a great help when you’re approaching a game.”

That confidence certainly seemed to help the team during last weeks 4-2 victory over Alloa, a match that at one point, was in danger of swinging towards the visitors, before a late rally saw Raith take all three points. Overall, Grant was happy with what he saw, and he knew exactly what pleased him the most,

“You’re always delighted when you manage to score four goals in a game, but especially against a team that had conceded so few up until that point. Dundee had struggled to break them down twice, and they’d kept clean sheets against Livingston, Queen of the South and Aberdeen, so it was a great result for us.”

“I was also really pleased at how we reacted to going a goal down. We won against Cowdenbeath after going behind, and ended up with a draw against Morton in the same circumstances, so it shows that we’ve got battling qualities, and are reacting well to the disappointment of losing a goal.”

It’s Falkirk who are next up for Raith, and while they followed up last weeks fine 3-1 win over Dundee with a disappointing League Cup exit to Aberdeen, Murray insists that no-one at Stark’s Park will be reading too much into that midweek defeat,

“They’ve started well, great in fact. A bit like us, they’ve made a lot of changes, with players leaving and new ones coming in, but despite that, they’re sitting third in a tough league, which is impressive. They hadn’t conceded many, a bit like Alloa, and their scoreline during the week is probably just one of those things that happen in football from time-to-time.”

“They’ve come up against an Aberdeen side who were on fire on the night, and we’ll need to be wary of them at the weekend, as Gary Holt will be looking for a big reaction from his players after Wednesday night, We’ve also got first hand knowledge of them from the Ramsdens Cup tie from earlier this month. They probably felt on the day that they didn’t take their chances, and it always looked like the kind of game where one goal would be enough, and thankfully we got it. I’m looking forward to Saturday’s game, but I’ve no doubt it’ll be hard.”

While Saturday’s game sees two of the Championship’s top goalscoring teams coming together, Grant would happily settle for just the one on Saturday,

“I’d take a 1-0 win any day of the week! We’d love to score goals, but I’ve been really pleased with the clean sheets recently, and they’re just as important to the team as getting it right at the other end. Obviously we conceded two on Saturday, and these things can happen, but as long as we’re keeping it tight at the back, just like we did against Dundee, Queen of the South and Falkirk previously, then it gives us a great platform to win football matches.”

 

Overall Head-to-Head League Record at Stark’s Park:

Raith Rovers Wins: 29 | Draws: 16 | Falkirk Wins: 25

Raith Rovers Goals: 107 | Falkirk Goals: 97

 

Top Goalscorers In All Competitions:

Raith: Greig Spence 6 | Joe Cardle 5 | Calum Elliot 3

Falkirk: Rory Loy 5 | Philip Roberts 5 | Jay Fulton 3

Match Odds:

Raith Rovers: 6/5 | Draw: 5/2 | Falkirk: 13/8

Shaughan McGuigan

 

Back to News