The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Pars boss scrambling for new faces
Dunfermline manager Allan Johnston admits he is desperately trying to add to his squad ahead of tomorrow’s Betfred Cup visit of Elgin City.
The Pars are short of form and players following a frustrating summer on and off the pitch.
Johnston admits he was concerned by his team’s 3-0 friendly defeat by Fife rivals Raith Rovers on Monday evening in a game where he was without injured attacking pair Nicky Clark and David Hopkirk.
The former Kilmarnock boss is keen to bring in at least three fresh faces, with one-time Rangers playmaker Dean Shiels high on his list.
Dunfermline also fell to a 4-0 loss to Hibs last week and began their preseason fixtures with a closed doors defeat by Partick Thistle, and Johnston is eager to bolster his playing staff.
He said: “You can see we are really light, even with a couple of injuries we’re really stretched. But, still, with the boys that are playing we should be doing better than we did against Raith the other night.
“We’re looking for three or four. Hopefully we’re close with a couple of them but time will tell.
“I don’t know if we can get them in by the weekend, it’s not up to me. It’s trying to get the players in, it’s all about agents, players and clubs.”
A slow start in the Championship last season left the Pars playing catch up in a futile bid to reach the play-offs, although Johnston recalls that his side actually enjoyed a productive pre-season.
He added: “We did well in pre-season last year then had a slow start.
“It’s hard to tell how the season is going to go but we need to get bodies in as well.
“We’re looking forward to the competitive action starting and it will be a good one to try and get out of our system as well.
“It will be a hard game because Elgin will come and make it really difficult, they’ve got nothing to lose.
“We’ve got to improve better than that, we’ve got to do better massively.
“We’ve not had many games. Because we’ve got a small squad, we’ve not arranged a lot of games.
“It is still kind of building up because the league is the priority, we’ve said that from day one, but you still want to do well in the cup as well.”
Hopkirk could return against Elgin after picking up a knock against Hibs but striker Clark is facing a long spell on the sidelines.
Johnston added: “You always lose people in the same position, we’ve just got to see how Nicky goes.
“He’s had a wee niggle for a while. It was a bit sore and we’ll see how it settles down.
“You can see we’re a bit light up front.”