Jim Jefferies on Hogmanay

31/12/12: No wholesale changes but maybe a couple as JJ looks to freshen up the line up and not exhaust his players who face four games in 11 days.

Jim Jefferies is hoping that in with the New Year will come changing fortunes for his young team:-

"The poor result against Falkirk was tempered by the fact that we had put in a performance. You can see that by the reaction of the crowd; we were down to ten men and there was great effort and commitment. Then Saturday was always going to be one of the most difficult fixtures; Morton are big and strong experienced side but after getting off to a good start we didn't go on from there.

"Sometimes you can take defeat like lately against Livingston and Falkirk when we went down to ten men early but still had chances to score but didn't take them. We paid the penalty. Against Hamilton it was a good enough performance as well and we had chances to put ourselves in front before they had their chances.

"I have said time and time again that there would be something around the corner, that's football. It is great when everything is going well, expectations get raised and it becomes frustrating when you see what has happened to us. But Saturday was totally different, we didn't deserve anything from the game. The hungrier, the stronger and the more determined team on the day won it.

"It has not been like us, the only other time that that has happened was against Partick Thistle. Twice in a season is not a disaster but you have to give the other team credit as well. These are defeats that could easily happen because they are experienced sides. Don't forget we are a young side that has done extremely well and at times like this they need to stick together and I have every faith and confidence that they will get back to winning ways. It is just a matter of time."

That time is hopefully on Wednesday against Raith Rovers and both Manager and fans would love to witness it getting back on track than in the home derby:-

"They are hurting and there is no better game than Wednesday to do that. You will see determination with everybody raising their game to try and get back to winning ways."

The Manager had warned three weeks ago of the tough period of games facing his team, coming up against teams who were on good form - Falkirk, Morton and Hamilton had all seen their fortunes improve.

"We played teams in form but then you look at results at the weekend and find that Airdrie got a draw against Partick, Dumbarton beat Falkirk. There is no doubt when they come and play us they raise their game. That was evidenced on Saturday; Dunfermline because of their stature and even more so because the Dunfermline players have had a lot of credit this season for being a good football team. Teams now are not going to sit back and allow that to happen. we have got to recognise that and we have got to get back to what we were doing earlier in the season. That is step our game up and start closing down teams. We did that against Falkirk and that sort of performance will win more games than we will lose. We have to find the consistency of that performance."

Raith Rovers will not be easy opponents but neither will be Dumbarton, Airdrie or Cowdenbeath. Jim Jefferies saw it as a warning that they all got good results at the weekend; two of them drawing and the Sons defeating the Bairns.

"There are no easy games but that's probably a good thing for making us wary that we cannot just turn up, we have to go out and earn it."

Other news on the final day of 2012 was that Paul Willis has elected to see out the rest of the season on loan to East Fife.  JJ said that he had given the 21 year old the choice:-

"Come in and battle away for a place, or continue to play regularly at East Fife. He said that he wanted the weekend to think about it and he has said that he was happy to be getting a game there every week and Billy was happy to keep him so that loan will be extended to the end of the season. Billy is concentrating on playing him in midfield and right now we have enough midfielders with Shaun Byrne coming through.  He is very close to be being included in the first team. Now that he has been training with the first team for a while I think the laddie will be in consideration in the second half of the season.

"You need to freshen it up because it has been a tough period, we have had three games in a week and they will be playing four games in eleven days."