Craig Easton positive despite losing out on the double

As the lights went out on Raith Rovers' Under 20's sides dream of a league and cup double this week, manager Craig Easton remains optimistic for the future.

Raith Rovers' under-20s coach Craig Easton (right). Picture: SNS

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When Easton took over last summer, he integrated a squad with only a handful of players signed up to it. But this season has been a roaring success for the Kirkcaldy side who won the Development League East last week.

Easton, talking about their league triumph, said: “It definitely wasn’t comfortable. We had to really fight for it in the last couple of months, where we had to win almost every game in the last section, but we did that.”

The goal then was to crown the season off with a cup final win against local rivals Cowdenbeath in the Fife Cup. However, the scoreline was 2-1 to the Blue Brazil, but Easton insists that the result wasn’t the be-all and end-all.

He added: “Don’t get me wrong, we would have loved to have won it, but the progress they have made has been brilliant. It would’ve been amazing if we could have put the Fife Cup alongside that [the Development League trophy] but to be fair, it was probably one of our poorest performances on the night and if you play like that in a cup final, you don’t deserve to win it.”

It isn’t all doom and gloom for the Stark’s Park side though as Easton concludes by saying: “It hurts, and it will for a while, but that’s a good thing.

“We’ve tasted success and we’ve tasted defeat. That’s football and they are going to get that throughout their career, highs and lows, but to be fair, in terms of their learning, it can’t be any better.”