East Fife boss Gary Naysmith is targeting all three points from his side’s trip to face Queen’s Park, despite being full of praise for his managerial counterpart.
Naysmith believes former St Mirren and Queen of the South manager Gus McPherson has got the Spiders playing some of the best football in League Two at the moment, borne out by the fact that they have won four of their last five league games en route to second spot.
The one they didn’t win, ironically, was against East Fife in mid-September, and Naysmith hopes to go one better than the 2-2 draw they achieved in that encounter.
“We should have been out of sight in the first half in that game a few weeks ago, but by the time 15 minutes came we were 2-1 down,” he commented.
“We got a goal back and it went to and fro.
“We were evenly matched against them, but I think Gus has done a fantastic job there.
“He’s assessed the squad he had last year and I think they won the Reserve League West last year so he’s probably seen a lot of decent players in that and picked the best out of them.
“He’s gone and recruited really well from the juniors as well, and when junior players come in they’ve got a point to prove.
“They want to prove they can come in and cut it at a senior level.
“So I think he’s done a fantastic job at Queen’s Park and I’d arguably say they’ve probably played the best football against us this season.
“Although we got a draw against them, they’ve probably been the team that have cut us open the most so I’m expecting an extremely tough game.”
Naysmith has bemoaned the injuries that have afflicted his squad of late, but he should have loanees Jack Smith and Jonathan Page back at his disposal after they missed the 2-0 Petrofac Cup defeat to Rangers in midweek.
Nevertheless, he still expects to have a few faces missing today and admits it has taken its toll in terms of their league position.
“We’re going to have to go on a run of winning four or five games in a row to have any chance of catching Arbroath, and hope that they lose a couple,” he continued.
“But again, we’ve had a lot of injuries and Arbroath have had a settled team, and you generally find that when you are winning you don’t get injuries because everybody wants to play.
“If you come out of the team you are not getting back in, so I’d imagine eight or nine of Arbroath’s players have been able to play every game this season.
“We’ve not been able to get that and the time when I’ve maybe had my strongest team to pick from is when we went to Arbroath and beat them.
“That doesn’t lie and I think when I’ve got my strongest squad available we can beat any team in the league.”