East Fife will look to bounce back from last Saturday’s William Hill Scottish Cup defeat from Berwick Rangers by seeing off second-placed Albion Rovers at Bayview.
Player/manager Gary Naysmith reckons that despite the Fife players having every reason to feel sorry for themselves they need to go out and shake things off by defeating the Coatbridge side.
Allan Walker, Jamie Beaton and Caolan McAleer were all dismissed as Naysmith’s side lost 3-2, with the former Scottish internationalist saying: “We are on a run just now where things are going against us.
“Crucial decisions look to be going in the favour of other teams and the penalty decision last weekend when it was 2-2 knocked the stuffing out of us.
“We can either sit about and complain about things or go out determined to brush everything off and start again.
“We have spoken about doing the latter and hopefully we can show that against a good Albion Rovers side.”
Naysmith added: “They have a very good goalkeeper in Neil Parry and a match-winner in John Gemmell.
“Their player-manager Darren Young missed out last week through injury and I will be looking at their team-sheet closely when I get it, because if his name is on it they are a stronger side.”
“However, we have good players here and this is a great opportunity for them to show that.
“A win lifts our spirits and, more importanty, plants us very strongly on the shoulders of the teams leading the way at the moment.”
McAleer misses out today through a ban as he was shown a straight red card, with Walker and Beaton free to play as they will serve suspensions in next season’s Scottish Cup.
Alan Cook remains out with an ankle injury with long-term injury absentee Cyrus Moosavi also absent.
The Coatbridge side wait on Young, who is struggling with a calf problem, with everyone else in the Cliftonhill squad available.