Raith Rovers centre-half Mark Campbell reckons his side still haven’t been given the credit they deserve for their tenacious title challenge so far this season making them all the more determined to prove the doubters wrong.
The Kirkcaldy club travel to Queen of the South this Saturday hoping to maintain pole position in the first division, knowing all the while that near neighbours Dunfermline are just three points adrift in second with a game in hand.
After holding their nerve to see off Stirling Albion last weekend though, Campbell is confident the Rovers players can rise to their latest challenge and continue to keep up their promotion push, despite the pundits continuing to write off their chances.
“Everybody is talking about Dunfermline and Falkirk and not mentioning us, which is up to them,” he said.
“But we’re still up there with 12 games to go and we’ll have a massive say in what’s going to happen and where the title will be going.
“We’ll just keep playing the way we’re playing and there are still 36 points for us to play for.
“It’ll be another big three points at stake for us against Queen of the South because we’re at the top and all of these teams are trying to get to where we are.
“But it’s important for us to focus on the game and take things one game at a time,” he added.
“I think some people forget that it’s only our second year back in the first division, yet we’ve managed to get the same number of points we did last year with 12 games to go.
“It shows how far we’ve come and hopefully we can maintain that until the end of the season.”PressureRovers will be hoping to emulate what their closest Fife rivals did last weekend, when the Pars won 3-1 at Palmerston to keep up the pressure at the top of the table, but Campbell is not one for the ‘anything you can do, we can do better’ approach.
“Every game is different, so it doesn’t matter what happened last week,” he said.
“Anything can happen and just because Dunfermline went and beat them last week doesn’t mean the pressure to get the three points is any different.
“Last week we only won 2-1 but we had a lot of pressure and a lot of chances. We need everybody to stick together and it doesn’t necessarily help when people are expecting you to win 2-0 or 3-0, but we got the result that mattered on Saturday.”
Rovers manager John McGlynn shares Sparky’s concerns about an apparent lack of recognition from some quarters about what they’ve achieved so far this campaign.
“We’ve been top for most of the season, yet people just disregard us,” McGlynn said.
“Every football pundit has written us off but we have to use that positively as a siege mentality.
“Let’s show people and prove them wrong, but there’s no doubt if things don’t work out for us they will turn around and say, ‘I told you so.’
“We never said we would win the league we just want to go as far as we can.”
McGlynn also still believes Queen of the South have an outside shot of winning the league and may see this as their last chance to peg back the leaders.
But he added, “We did very well there earlier in the season and if we can reproduce that level of performance that would be excellent.”
Scott McBride’s hamstring problem and Iain Williamson’s foot injury could see them sidelined for the trip south, while Iain Davidson is still out through suspension.
Rovers fans should note that admission prices for Palmerston are £17 for adults, £10 for concessions and 12 to 16-year-olds, £6 for disabled and carers (each) and £5 for juveniles under 12 years.
Queen of the South manager Kenny Brannigan said, “We have 10 experienced outfield players for this game and that is a bit of a luxury compared to what we have had recently.
“All 10 boys are good players so we can be confident going into this game.”
The Doonhamers are without suspended Stephen McKenna and the injured midfield pair of Paul Burns and Rocco Quinn.