East Fife slipped to the bottom of League One after conceding what manager Willie Aitchison called “two clangers” in a competitive fixture at Stranraer.
Despite losing a goal in either half, he praised his team’s work rate, but was left lamenting missed chances early in the game.
Aitchison said: “I think we actually played quite well, we controlled a lot of the passing, although Stranraer were quite condensed and solid at the back and played back-to-front quite well.
“We just made two clangers and it cost us the result. They’ve come here and started well, controlled the game a wee bit and lost a really sloppy, comical goal.
“To this point I still can’t actually figure out how it’s ended up in the net because we had about four or five players around the ball at one point.”
The Fifers squandered an early chance when Gary Thom sent a header wide and Stranraer cashed in midway through the first half when the visiting defence dithered and Martin Grehan pounced to slam the ball into an unguarded net.
East Fife continued to play some attractive football and were almost rewarded on the restart when Scott McBride drew a fine diving save from David Mitchell.
Instead of being level, Aitchison’s men found themselves two goals down when Stranraer swept forward in a fine counter-attacking move which saw substitute Jamie Longworth only on the field five minutes capitalise after some fine interplay from David McKenna and Chris Aitken.
The Fifers refused to tgive up, but could find no way to beat an inspired home keeper in Mitchell.
Aitchison remains upbeat, adding: “It’s only six games in to the season and we’ve got 24 new players. If we get a few breaks and cut out the silly mistakes, I think we’ll be okay.”