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Striker Rory McAllister and manager Paul Hartley spoke to the media after our 3-3 cinch League One draw with Queen’s Park at Balmoral Stadium.

Rory, who was chosen as man-of-the-match by sponsors Colin Lawson Transport and scored his 12th goal of the campaign in what was an enthralling encounter, said: “The result was tough to take, it felt as if we had actually lost the game.

“We have to take the positives from it though.

“We played well last week and scored three goals and we did the same again this week.

“We are starting to look more like our old selves and if we keep playing as well, the season could turn out pretty well for us.

“Queen’s Park are full-time, but anyone watching the game would have thought we were the full-time side.

“We dominated 90% of the game and if we can keep up those sorts of standards, we will be up there challenging when we get to the business end of the season.

“Our first 40 minutes were amazing, I scored, we also hit the woodwork and had another couple of decent chances.

“If we had been three or four nil up they couldn’t have really complained.

“But that’s football, you have to take your chances, or you usually find that comes back to hurt you.

“We were still a bit unlucky not to win in the end though and we have taken a lot of confidence out of the way we competed against one of the top sides in our division.”

Rory looked to have claimed his 13th of the season, when he and Queen’s Park defender Stuart Morrison competed for the Blair Yule cross that led to our third goal, but he confessed he didn’t get the final touch.

“I normally claim for everything, but it was the defender who scored that time,” said Rory.

“I was happy to get one and could have had more, but it’s encouraging we were able to create as many chances as we did.

“We will need to keep that going when we go to Montrose next weekend.

“It will be another tough game because they are a decent team, with a lot of very good individual players.

“Every game is tough in this league though, so we know what will be needed from us if we want to keep competing at the top end.”

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Cove’s Manager Paul Hartley during the Scottish League One game between Cove Rangers FC and Queen’s Park FC at Balmoral Stadium, Aberdeen, Scotland, on Saturday 30th October 2021 ( Photo by Dave Cowe )

Manager Paul said: “It was a really good game, full of attacking football, really open.

“I thought we were absolutely terrific for the first 40 minutes.

“We were really good with some of our attacking play and should have scored more goals.

“We then just switch off for a couple of key moments, just before half-time.

“It’s a reminder that you really have to keep things going for the full 45.

“We regrouped after that, we told them (the players) at half-time that they were doing well and should still believe they could win the game.

“We managed to get the equaliser and then get ahead, our opponents going down to 10 men obviously helped.

“But we didn’t do our jobs at their third goal, we should have done better.

“Some of our other stuff was absolutely outstanding though, especially in that first period, when we bossed the game.

“It was disappointing not to pick three points up, but at least we didn’t lose.

“It was a great advert for League One and I do believe things will go down to the last games of the season, because of the quality of the teams.”

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