It might not be happening at the pace they would choose, but Dundee midfielder Gavin Rae has insisted that progress is being made nonetheless.
The so-so start to the season continued for the Dark Blues in Kirkcaldy on Saturday with this stalemate. However, the Scottish Championship favourites had a goal disallowed and several other near misses.
According to Rae this could quite easily have been the result to put their marker down for the promotion campaign.
The club captain pointed out: “I thought we were on top in the first half and had a few good chances. We were unfortunate not to get a goal from some good set-piece deliveries.
“We had the ball in the net, but it was ruled out. The second half was more even but we’re gutted not to take the three points.
“Every game away from home will be like that. We know we’ve got to battle. On another day the chances would have gone in. We’re not playing as well as we can but hopefully it will click soon.
“We wanted to be cohesive as a team from the start but I think there are little improvements being made as we go along. We’re not gelling as well as we can yet but we’re getting there slowly every week.
“A point away from home at a tough ground like this isn’t a disaster. We’d have maybe taken it at the start of the game.”
The chalked off goal was a Declan Gallagher back post header from a Jim McAlister corner on 40 minutes. There were a number of balls in the Raith box the centre-half won fairly over the course of the match, and this looked to be one of them.
“I was quite surprised the referee blew because I felt Dec got up well,” Rae stated.
That McAlister corner was the first of three inswingers in relatively quick succession that the home defence failed to deal with. Gary Irvine guided a header past the far post with the second, and Peter MacDonald couldn’t keep his effort down with the third.
Rae was right to suggest Dundee should have been leading at the break, but he was also pretty accurate with his second half assessment. It was a much more evenly balanced 45 minutes of football.
Raith’s Grant Anderson had a low 18-yarder through a ruck of legs well saved by Kyle Letheren and Lewis Vaughan had a shot smothered from close range.
At the other end Gallagher forced a brilliant stop out of David McGurn with another header, and when the ball came back to him his second effort was cleared off the line. There was also an angled shot from substitute Steven Doris which shaved the far post.
Rovers could take satisfaction from their second half showing, the highlight of which was the classy debut performance of 17-year-old forward Vaughan.
Rightly voted man-of-the-match by the sponsors, he was their sharpest attacking threat and it looks like the Kirkcaldy fans have a new hero. The shirt number said 21, but this is a number 10 in the making.
The teenager reflected: “It was brilliant to get a point and man of the match on my debut. I’ve been here since under-15s. This is my second full-time season and I’ve been working away to try and make it hard for the gaffer not to pick me.
“I was told before the match I was
playing. My mum and dad were at the game, and so were my uncle and aunt. I gave them a text before the match but they were coming anyway.
“I was a wee bit nervous but the fans were great and the players talked me through the game. You couldn’t ask for a better dressing room. My game is to get the ball and run at defenders, and link up the ball between midfield and the strikers.”
The visit to Stark’s Park of Hearts tomorrow night in the League Cup is an exciting prospect for all the Raith players, but Vaughan has an extra incentive for dumping Gary Locke’s men out of the competition.
“I’m a Hibs fan,” he admitted.
“It would be great to be involved in that one. There will probably be even more family looking to come to this one!
“I’d have loved to get a goal to cap my debut, but there’s always Tuesday.”
Raith boss Grant Murray revealed that it was a compliment to his debutant that he tweaked his formation and played Calum Eliot in an unfamiliar central midfield role to accommodate Vaughan in his favourite off-the-striker position.
“We had to shuffle the team about and that shows what we think of him,” he said.
“Calum dropped into the middle of the park and Lewis played in areas where he’s hard to mark. He did very well for his first start. He’s a lively lad. He’s very advanced for his age, has great skill and an eye for goal. He always wants to get a shot off and was unlucky on a couple of occasions.
“It was a credit to Calum as well that he played in a new position.”
John Brown was frustrated at referee John Beaton’s performance, and the decision not to award a penalty to MacDonald when he and Elliot came shoulder to shoulder in the box was the chief sin in his eyes.
“I thought we had a stonewall penalty for Peter MacDonald,” Brown insisted.
“The referee hasn’t seen anything for Dundee. That’s the bottom line. He gave us nothing, absolutely nothing. I thought our disallowed goal should have stood as well. It was an outstanding header.”
On the match overall, he observed: “It was two points dropped but it was a clean sheet.
“We’re struggling in the final third. We had a number of set-pieces which got us free headers. It was our finishing that let us down.
Murray noted: “I thought it was a great game and I was delighted with my boys’ effort against a strong Dundee side.”