A point at home to Inverness, though not ideal, was acceptable in the circumstances for Dunfermline.
The result looks worse in the context of their current run – one win from six matches – but there has been an uptick in their performances since the end of last month.
Inverness came to East End Park on Saturday unbeaten in five under their new manager Duncan Ferguson, who was happy to leave with a point given the Pars’ pressure.
Courier Sport looks at the talking points from Dunfermline’s 1-1 draw at home to Inverness.
Performance there again from Dunfermline
The result wasn’t what they wanted but again there was a lot to like about they took the game to Inverness, who also had their opportunities in the game.
Defeats to Ayr United and Partick Thistle are the only two Dunfermline games that you could say the team had an off-day.
The second halves against Raith and Dundee United have both warranted something from the respective games.
It was almost the same old story on Saturday before McCann found the net late on.
It shouldn’t be forgotten that Dunfermline are a newly promoted side, even though they shouldn’t have been down in League One in the first place, and a young one.
Only Queen’s Park have a lower average age for minutes played in the Championship this season.
Finding the finishing touches
The reason that Dunfermline didn’t take all three points on Saturday was that they didn’t convert enough of their many chances
Bad luck plays its part given the number of times they struck the woodwork but the fact is Dunfermline are among the lowest scorers in the division.
There have been mitigating circumstances, not least due to the number of injuries to key players, but Owen Moffat has started to find the net recently and Lewis McCann’s goal return so far cannot be argued with.
He showed persistence to finally convert after hitting both posts with one effort in the first half and hitting the woodwork again later on after rounding Mark Ridgers.
They may not be scoring a lot of goals but Dunfermline are at least getting into the right areas and creating good opportunities.
Home form
After building up an impressive home record last season, things have slipped at East End Park at the start of this campaign.
Even putting Saturday’s draw aside, Dunfermline have lost three of their six home matches so far in the Championship.
There is a chance to start correcting that in Friday night’s Fife derby, the fourth of the season.
After that, the Pars have back-to-back league matches at home against Arbroath and Queen’s Park.
Todd and Ritchie-Hosler return
Ahead of Friday, it was excellent news for Dunfermline to give Kane Ritchie-Hosler and Matty Todd their first starts.
Ritchie-Hosler was preferred to Aaron Comrie at right-wingback and Todd came into the front three.
Both contributed and looked lively early on and understandably tired in the second half
The squad is looking much better now and they just need to work Kyle Benedictus and Rhys Breen back to fitness to have more or less a full complement and options all over the pitch.
Conversation