Dunfermline Athletic 3 - 1 Raith Rovers: Pars dominate a Fife frenzy

Even they must wonder why the ambition is to become a hapless, relegation-threatened SPL side playing in front of empty stadia when they are already a young, vibrant one attracting big crowds to the First Division.

Some 5,634 turned up for this Fife derby, which had all the usual trimmings. Meaty tackles, a missed penalty and a lengthy lecture by the referee to Jim Jefferies, the Dunfermline manager, were all features of an entertaining grapple in which goals by Ryan Wallace, Josh Falkingham and Andy Barrowman secured a deserved victory for the home side.

With Andy Geggan tirelessly winning the ball in midfield, and  Falkingham stroking it about nicely, Dunfermline were the better team throughout, scoring twice in a first half they dominated, and responding well to the loss of a goal early in the second.

“What you look for, when you have a young team like we do, is how they handle these situations,” said Jefferies. “And I have to say they handled it fantastically well.

“We had a hatful of chances we never took. And the football that produced our third goal was fantastic.”

Jefferies also was full of praise for the crowd and the atmosphere. This was what John Yorkston, their  chairman, meant when he said that relegation from Scotland’s top flight was nothing to be afraid of. The return of the derby, he predicted, would bring about an increase in the club’s average attendance.

It was the usual full-blooded Fife frenzy. Falkingham was lucky just to be on the pitch. His late lunge at Eddie Malone would have merited a straight red had it not been done within 30 seconds of the start. Malone later gave the Dunfermline midfield player a fat lip. Then, when Andy Dowie body-checked Grant Anderson, Calum Murray, the referee, had little option but to point at the spot. Brian Graham’s penalty was decent enough, but Paul Gallacher beat the ball away with a dive to his right. It was the pivotal moment of a first half in which Dunfermline were by far the more incisive. Ten minutes after they had been let off the hook, they went ahead. When Colin Wilson stumbled in his own box, Wallace quickly capitalised by thumping a low shot past David McGurn.

Dunfermline called all the shots in that opening period, most of them saved by McGurn, who denied Barrowman, Wallace and Joe Cardle, before succumbing to little  Falkingham in his own six-yard area. Cardle provided the cross, and the smallest man on the pitch scored with his head.

Player-manager Grant Murray came on for Raith in the second half, in the early stages of which a goal by Graham, already his tenth of the season, gave the visitors hope. Allan Walker’s free kick was perfect, as was the finish by Graham, whose firm header found the bottom corner.

The pity for Raith, and perhaps the game as a spectacle, was that the reduced deficit lasted only five minutes.

Dunfermline swept up the park with a slick, passing movement that culminated in a cross by Geggan and a header by Barrowman that left McGurn with no chance.

Thereafter, the game swung from one end to the other. Cardle fired wide for Dunfermline and Wallace turned into the net a deflected shot by Falkingham, only to have it disallowed for offside. When David Smith, a Raith substitute, was clean through with 14 minutes left, the save by Gallacher more or less ended any hope the visitors had of a recovery.