Pars boss Jim Jefferies reckons full points from his side’s next two league games will be the perfect preparation for their trip to face Rangers next month.
Dunfermline head into fixtures at home to Ayr and away to Forfar in second spot in League One, just five points adrift of Ally McCoist’s league leaders, and Jefferies has challenged his team to stay in touch ahead of their meeting at Ibrox on October 12.
“That’s what we’ve got to do,” he told Courier Sport.
“You saw on Sunday against Forfar just how hard it is for Rangers it’s never easy up there and I think anybody who watched would say Forfar caused their own downfall, although, probably on the balance of play, they deserved to take something.
“There’s a long, long way to go, Rangers are still favourites and you can understand why because they’ve got more experience than us and have played at a lot higher level than some of our players.
“The key to the whole thing will be about how we handle the rest of the teams in the league.
“If we’re doing well and in touch with Rangers, when the games come against them, they become important if you want to either close the gap or be pushed further away.
“But there’s no point in beating Rangers and throwing it away against the lesser teams, so we’ll endeavour to look after all the other games, which are just as important.
“We’ll look at the Rangers game as a glamour game in a couple of weeks’ time, but we’ve got to be on their coat tails going into that game and the only way we’ll do that is to win our next two games.
“You’ve got to expect Rangers will win their two games and, if they don’t, it just makes things a bit more interesting when we play them.”
Looking ahead to Dunfermline’s date at Ibrox, it emerged yesterday that the Pars have been allocated just 419 tickets for the fixture on October 12, which will be shown on TV with a 5.30pm kick-off.
That will no doubt anger supporters keen on making the trip to Glasgow, and Jefferies hopes more will be made available.
“It’s not my side of things but we’re taking a fair bit of travelling support away to the games, which is good for all the other clubs as well,” he added.
“It’s not as if we could say to Rangers: ‘We’ll only give you 400’, because we need a big gate as well.
“That’s something the club will have to take up, but I’m sure there will be a big demand for them from our fans.
“Of course, from the playing side of things, it would be great to have as many fans there as possible. They’ve been terrific and they’ve got right behind the team all the time.
“You can hear them when we go away to all these grounds, to Stenhousemuir and Brechin, and it makes a big difference.
“They’ll be outnumbered at Ibrox by a long shot but sometimes, when they know that, they get louder.”
Only left-sided player Alex Whittle did not train with the squad on Thursday ahead of the home game against Ayr United, although he is expected to be fit.
“Whittle took a wee knock in training and didn’t train as a precaution,” Jefferies said.
“We’ve been very fortunate in the last three weeks because we’ve had a fully fit squad to choose from and nothing’s different on Saturday.”