LATEST NEWS
For previous news articles see the monthly archive at the foot of this page.
New Signing Imminent 31st December 2003
As the new year approaches along with it comes the 2004 January transfer window. Manager John Connolly has made swift moves to ensure the continued success of his side and has lined up another signature for January 1st. The new signing will be 20 year old right sided player Stephen Payne from Aberdeen, a player that you may remember played so well against us in the Scottish Cup replay at Pittodrie last February. The youngster hails from Glasgow.
Our New Chairman 30th December 2003
Queens new Chairman David Rae has spoken about his aspirations for the club, click here to read his thoughts.
WE FEAR NO-ONE NOW SAYS JC 29th December 2003
Still upbeat following Saturday's great win over Falkirk, John Connolly told the 'Website' that Queens fear no side in Division One now. Said a delighted manager "I keep stressing to our players, week in week out that no team has outclassed us this season. Yes, we lost a few goals against Clyde and Inverness but they came from individual errors. Our home record has been particularly impressive, we have only lost twice at Palmerston and just the top two sides can boast a better home record than that. We've now faced all five promotion rivals at home, we've beaten four of them and drawn with St Johnstone. We netted four against Clyde, the league leaders, and three against Caley Thistle who lie second, so I don't think many sides relish a visit to Dumfries now, especially with the tremendous support we're getting. We'd over 4000 on Saturday and it's worth a goal of a start. It seems the bigger the crowd the better we play, but all professional footballers thrive on atmosphere and that's what big crowds generate.

"In the early part of the season we had Sean O'Connor and Alex Burke getting most of the goals for us, now Gary Wood has started to find the net and with every goal he scores his confidence seems to grow which is great".

We put it to John that if we could win our next two league matches against Ayr and Raith Rovers (currently second and third bottom of the table) and reach the 39 point mark, would he stop looking over his shoulder at the foot of the table? He replied "Our policy at Palmerston is to take one game at a time and put as many points on the board as possible. Neither of these games will be easy! Ayr have started picking up points and Raith are one of the two teams who have beaten us at home this season. Both are fighting for survival and as I keep emphasising NO game in this league is easy".

With the 'Windows' re-opening on Thursday, will we see any changes in personnel we then queried? "There will be faces going out with Derek Allen and Paul Talbot likely to leave and new faces coming in" he assured us. "We will be looking at players from other clubs and they in turn will be looking at Queens' players. We now have a lot of good players at Palmerston--obviously the likes of Sean O'Connor who has been knocking in the goals since his return to the team could be a target but if the right offer came along for any player, and the player himself wanted to move, we would consider it. That's the nature of football.

"We actually signed a player this afternoon--19-year-old Paul McMullan from Hearts. He's a left-sided player and we've got him on loan until the end of the season. I believe he made 15 first team appearances for Hearts last season, so I hope we can do the same for Paul as we did for Robbie Neilson last season". Asked about Partick Thistle's interest in Jim Thomson, the manager just shook his head. "I don't know where that one came from--it's just newspaper talk and speculation as far as I'm concerned".

Bill Goldie
Man of the Match 29th December 2003
Top marks to super striker Sean O'Connor this week as he takes the IFC Man of the Match award for terrorising the Bairns defence on Saturday. Second place went to Bowser with Gary Wood in third.

All of the individual scores can be found on the Report page and the Player of the Season league table has been updated and has a new leader tonight, it can be found via the Man of the Match link.
New Queens Related Website Launched 28th December 2003
A new Queens website has just been launched which will be of interest to all Queens fans who collect Doonhamers memorabilia. Run by well know Queens fan and Club Historian Ian Black the site, named after the old timber shed that stood on the site of the new East Stand, you will find it at www.cooshed.co.uk. The site has just been launched and already has an extensive listing of programmes for sale back to the mid-sixties and all of the enamel badges that have been produced related to Queens are also shown along with scans of the covers of a number of very important and valuable programmes in Ian's collection.
Queens 2-0 Falkirk - Reaction 27th December 2003
Said a delighted John Connolly after the match, "These lads of mine never cease to amaze me. They're all part time and this week our training has been severely curtailed with the wet weather yet they still go out there and beat one of the promotion favourites - a side that were unbeaten away from home this season. They were all bitterly disappointed being denied a victory at Perth last week but the response today was nothing short of fantastic, we did have our wee hiccup when we lost three in a row last month but we've now taken seven points from three games - two of them against championship favourites so now I hope some of the pundits who had written us off will sit up and take notice.

"We put away two good chances but it should have been four or five and I rate it one of our best performances of the season, perhaps even the best.

"I always said it would be Christmas before this league sorted itself out but it's now time we started looking upwards instead of downwards.

"Next week we're away to Ayr United, they won today so it's not going to be easy at Somerset but the reality is there are no easy games in this league".

Falkirk manager John Hughes was gutted but said, "I can't fault my players for their performance but it's obvious we're lacking punch up front. Now it's back to the drawing board and the training park to sort out our problems".

Sponsors Man of the Match Steve Bowey paid tribute to his team mates when receiving his award, "There wasn't a Man of the Match out there today there were eleven Man of the Match" said Bowser.

One of the happiest players in the Queens dressing room after the game was big Brian Reid who proved a stalwart in defence, "That was one match I really wanted to win", he confessed, "Falkirk 'did the dirty' on me last season handing me a free transfer so it's great to prove them wrong, they've been going on all week about their lucky white strips and being unbeaten away from home this season".

Bill Goldie
Top Marks Del 26th December 2003
Congratulations to Derek Lyle our own Tan Man who came out on top in this weeks Daily Record University Challenge. He and seven other players from Scottish football took part in the charity event and Del Boy was the winner scoring eight points out of ten.

For those who read the article the two questions he failed on were, What's the capital of Australia? (Answer: Canberra), Where and when did Alan Wells win his Olympic Gold? (Answer: Moscow in 1980). "I was too young to remember that one", joked Derek. At the end of the event the team raised £470 for charity, well done lads.
Team News 24th December 2003
Queens have an unchanged squad for the home match on Saturday against a Falkirk side who are unbeaten away from home in the league this season.

Falkirk's General Manager Crawford Babtie reckons his club could bring 500 - 800 fans to Palmerston for the game.

In other news Joe McAlpine resumed training on Monday and it is hoped he'll be back in action by the end of January.

Bill Goldie
Half Term Report 23rd December 2003
With the season now at the half-way stage Queens sit comfortably on the 30 point mark, neatly tucked in there in fourth place in the table. We have lost only two games at home and in the 22 matches to date have failed to score in only three of them. In an exclusive interview for the "Website" John Connolly said he was very satisfied with the progress. "I think it's brilliant what we've achieved and I'd be delighted if we could match it in the second half of the season. 60 points would be fantastic. Back in July 'Scottie' and I sat down and reckoned we'd need 40 points to stay up. Retaining First Division status was our main priority for to my knowledge no 'part-time' side has yet managed to survive longer than two seasons. After that you concentrate on bettering last season's position--which was fifth--then try and get up into the top three. So with 30 points at halfway, we're well ahead of schedule".
After 19 points in the first quarter and only 11 in the second quarter, were you a bit disappointed? we asked "Not at all" was the reply! "We topped the table for five weeks and our only real hiccup was losing these three games in a row. But I always maintained it would get more difficult once winter set in! We had injuries to key players such as Sean O'Connor, Colin Scott, Steve Bowey and Joe McAlpine and with a relatively small pool of players it made it very difficult for us".
Going through the games John recalls "We lost to Clyde and Caley Thistle but in both matches we were ahead at half time and had we taken our chances we could have had the games won by the interval. Lapses of concentration early in the second half then cost us dearly. Against Ross County, bad defending cost us the only goal of the game and subsequently the match and the home defeat by St Mirren was undoubtedly our worst display of the season. But having said that, they had a new manager and were really up for it while we'd just lost our number one keeper through injury the week before.

"We drew twice with St Johnstone. The 1-1 at Palmerston was a fair result but the 2-2 draw at Perth on Saturday was nothing less than 'daylight robbery'. However, I'm not going into it in detail for I'll just get angry again. Our three victories were against the bottom sides, Raith Rovers, Ayr and Brechin. We ground out 1-0 wins against all three but these nine points were so precious for it gave us a handy 'comfort cushion' from the foot of the table which takes an awful lot of pressure off players".

Looking forward to the second half of the season, John reckons that St Johnstone and Caley Thistle are still the two favourites for promotion. He says "St Johnstone have the strongest squad in depth in our division while the Inverness side have brought in quality players with loads of skill--all of whom are capable of scoring goals. Clyde are currently top of the table and are a big, strong physical side with lots of pace who fight hard for each other but Falkirk can't be written off either. During the close season they lost players such as Coyle, Miller and Samuels and it's hard to replace quality like that. They are not performing too well at their adopted home, Ochilview, but are still unbeaten in the league away from home.

"Ross County are still up there in the 'mix' and their facilities at Dingwall are second only to Rangers in Scottish football. I really envy them with their Soccer Academy and superb indoor training facilities compared to ours which are non-league standard. If we are to progress it's imperative they improve and that goes for our stadium as well.

"Gus McPherson has certainly given St Mirren a lift and their results have improved since he took over, however I feel they're still too far behind to catch the leaders. Of the bottom three Raith Rovers play attractive football but they have a lot of foreign players who may toil in our winter conditions. At Ayr, Campbell Money has a very young side, and I admire Campbell for he's doing a great job in difficult circumstances. Bringing on youngsters is certainly the way forward so I hope Ayr don't go down. At Brechin my old mate Dick Campbell now needs a miracle to survive, but knowing Dick he'll fight until the last kick of the ball".

Any new players in line for when the 'windows' re-open in January? we then asked John. "We've two or three in mind" admitted the manager "But our priority is a back-up keeper. Doddsie has done great since he came back into the side, but he's still young and we need cover for him".

In his final statement John wished all Queens fans the compliments of the season and thanked them for their tremendous support throughout 2003.

Bill Goldie
View from the Stand 22nd December 2003
David Gow managed to capture the superb Brian Reid headed goal on Saturday, to view it click on the link below, it will take a little time to download as it is around 3.5Mb in size.

David Gow's Fan's Eye View of the goal
New Shop Items 22nd December 2003
Available at the Club Shop from this weekend are the items pictured below, the gloves are £4.50 and the Water Bottle is £3.50.

Man of the Match 22nd December 2003
Eric Paton takes the travelling members of the Internet Fan Club Man of the Match award for this weekend following his starring performance against St.Johnstone. Scoring centre back Brian Reid takes second whilst the ever troublesome Sean O'Connor won the third place in the ratings.

To see how everyone else scored click on the 'Latest Report' link whilst the player of the season league table can be found via the 'Man of the Match' link.
Cup Draw 21st December 2003
In the third round draw for the Scottish Cup Queens have been paired with East Fife at Methill. John Connolly's response was predictable, "Another away tie but we're getting used to it now, so we'll just have to get on with it. That's five away games we've had in the three cup competitions this season.

"East Fife moved up a league last season and are currently sitting mid-way in the second division table . We will go to Bayview as favourites but we can't afford to be complacent, they won 2-0 at Peterhead in the previous round so it will not be an easy match. They have nothing to lose and the pressure will be on us but we're confident we can overcome this hurdle and proceed to the next round.

If we play as we did yesterday at St.Johnstone it shouldn't be a problem but it's a cup game and as we all know anything can happen in the cup".

Bill Goldie
St.Johnstone 2-2 Queens - Reaction 20th December 2003
John Connolly was totally gutted after the game. Groaned the manager, "I know I said I'd take a point from this match but to lose a goal five minutes into injury time is hard to take. I don't know where the extra five minutes came from but even at that Paatelinan looked suspiciously offside.

"McDiarmid Park is proving a hoodoo ground for us for late goals, for only last season we were leading 2-0 going into injury time and finished up drawing 2-2. But it was a tremendous display by the lads today and they battled for every ball in testing conditions. I was proud of every one of them.

"We even gave them a gift goal of a start, Doddsy made a good stop, the ball fell at the feet of Jim Thomson but in attempting to clear it's sclaffed off Jim's boot into the net. That would have dumped many teams but Sean O'Connor snatched an equaliser three minutes later to see us go in at the interval on level terms.

"We took the lead eight minutes from time following a corner Brian Reid flashed an unstoppable header into the top corner of the net. It was the big mans first goal for Queens and what a beauty it was.

"In the first league game of the season we lost 4-1 up here but I always maintained the scoreline flattered them. But here we are tonight driving away from the ground of the Championship favourites disappointed with a draw. It just goes to show how well we've progressed.

"Never the less the draw sees us move up one place in the table with Caley Thistle v Falkirk match postponed. We are now half way through our league programme and sit on thirty points and that's now an eighteen point comfort cushion we have over the second bottom side."

New Chairman David Rae was also full of praise for the team and said, "They showed tremendous commitment. It was a very exciting game of football - good end to end stuff". But he too thought the injury time was excessive, however Queens are still unbeaten since David took over, four points from two games and it should have been six.

Bill Goldie
Team News 18th December 2003
Sean Ferrie has been added to the squad for the visit to St.Johnstone on Saturday, the young winger has been scoring freely with the reserves this season and has notched up eight goals to date, only last Saturday he netted twice in the 3-2 win over Nithsdale Wanderers at Sanquhar. Emilio Jaconelli is still sidelined with a hamstring injury but the good news is that Colin Scott and Joe McAlpine are progressing well. The 'keeper was given a very good report by the surgeon following a thorough examination on Saturday while Joe is making a steady recovery from his appendix operation.

"It will be a tough match at Perth" confessed John Connolly "they beat us 4-1 up there in the first league match of the season and have only lost one of their last eleven matches. They have the strongest squad in our division and several ex-Internationalists. But we got back into winning mode with our victory over Brechin at the weekend so I'm hoping it's instilled a bit of added confidence into the players".

Bill Goldie
New Director 18th December 2003
Queen of the South have announced the appointment of a new director, Lockerbie Building Contractor Billy Hewitson. Both Billy and his brother Davie played for the club in the late seventies and early eighties, their father David(Senior) also worked behind the scenes at Palmerston for several years. Life-long Queens fan Billy said it was a great honour for him to serve on the board of directors of such a well known and respected team.
Stat Attack 16th December 2003
Queens have had one of their most successful spells for many a year recently, Queens Press Officer Bill Goldie totted up the stats and came up with the following figures:
Season
Won
Drawn
Lost
Percent
Total
68
29
52
52
2000/01
17
7
18
46
2001/02
22
7
12
59
2002/03
18
13
14
50
2003/04
11
2
8
56
Man of the Match 15th December 2003
Eric Paton wins his third successive home Man of the Match award for his performance versus Brechin City on Saturday, match sponsors Man of the Match, Gary Wood, was no where to be seen in the top four of the internet fan club voting as John Dodds was voted second and Sean O'Connor third.

All of the other scores can be found on the Latest Report link whilst the Player of the Season league table has also been updated and can be found via the Man of the Match link.
Queens 1-0 Brechin - Reaction 13th December 2003
John Connolly was disappointed with the performance but delighted to have picked up three points.

Said the manager, "I'll be the first to admit that we were lucky to get a win out there this afternoon. It had a one goal game written all over it but as the minutes ticked by I would have settled for a draw.

"We didn't play well at all. We couldn't pass the ball from A to B and our delivery was very poor. But football's football and I'll take every point that's going.

"Brechin are down there at the bottom fighting for survival and I'm sure they would have gone home happy with a draw. They stuck bodies behind the ball to make it hard but having said that it's still up to us to break them down. Three plus points did come out of the game;

"Big Sean played for the full ninety minutes, Doddsy was solid in goal and Gary Wood is now doing what we bought him to do - score goals. The three points keep us up there with the leaders but we'll have to play much better in our next two games to take anything off St.Johnstone and Falkirk".

Brechin manager Dick Campbell was as sick as a proverbial parrot, "We had a penalty turned down and the Queens goal came from a corner that never was. It's a true saying - when you're down you're down!"

Gary Wood confessed he was surprised and a bit embarrassed to get the sponsors Man of the Match award, "I was only on the park for sixteen minutes but I suppose my goal swung it. I'm just delighted to be scoring - that's three in the last four games and I won't complain at that!"

Bill Goldie
Caley Programme 11th December 2003
If you are looking for a programme for the Inverness game last Saturday then you need to be quick at the Club Shop on Saturday as there are only around eight available.

BLW
Team News 11th December 2003
Queens will be without Joe McAlpine who is recovering from an appendix operation and striker Emilio Jaconelli who has tweaked a hamstring for the match against bottom of the table Brechin City on Saturday. John Dodds will be in goal for the injured Colin Scott who has been badly missed.

Said John Connolly "A win will put us right back up there with the leaders and will also give us more of a comfort cushion over the bottom two. Even Donald Park, Caley Thistle assistant manager was saying at Inverness last week that they always keep a weather eye on the results at the bottom for it's such a competitive league and anything could happen.

But after three defeats on the trot we'll be up for it. Like ourselves Dick Campbell has goalkeeper problems but knowing Dick I'm sure he'll conjure a 'keeper out of somewhere".

Bill Goldie
Ideal Gift 10th December 2003
In the Club Shop this weekend, Saturday as usual and Sunday between 2.00pm and 4.00pm you will have the chance to purchase the ideal gift for Queens fans. A special collection of four minature whisky's has been produced to commemorate the four major trophies that Queens have won over the years. Priced at £17.50 they will undoubdetly go quickly.

AGM Notes 9th December 2003
There was a very good turnout of 82 shareholders at the Nith Hotel in Glencaple this evening for the Annual General Meeting of Queen of the South Football Club. The formal business of the night was concluded promptly under the acting Chairman Tommy Harkness. Items discussed included a glowing thanks paid to the Youth Team coaches for their sterling efforts on behalf of the club and to the previous Chairman Ronnie Bradford, who was present this evening, and his wife Shirley for their term on the board.

Issues were also discussed regarding the development of the club with the acting Chairman pointing out that full-time football at Dumfries would come at considerable cost requiring a substantial increase in attendances.

After the conclusion of the formal business a major announcement regarding the Board of Directors was made as board member David Rae stepped up to become the new Chairman of Queen of the South Football Club. Mr Rae took the time to introduce himself to the shareholders, recalling his first visit to Palmerston as an eleven year old to witness a game in which Queens defeated Partick Thistle 8-2. Following a brief introduction Mr Rae opened the floor to questions for the 'Football Forum' part of the evening with manager John Connolly.

A lively session was then entered into as shareholders discussed the way forward for Queens with the manager and board.

There was some discussion regarding the present and potential future players at the club in general terms. JC discussed his aspirations and revealed that he saw a mix of full-time and part-time playing staff in the future.

However it was stressed that the main priority at the present time for the manager is the acquisition of some good quality training ground facilities as the present location at Maxwelltown does not provide a secure or good enough quality environment.
AGM 8th December 2003
A reminder to all shareholders that the Annual General Meeting of the Queen of the South Football Club Ltd., will take place tomorrow evening at 7.30pm at the Nith Hotel, Glencaple.
Injury Updated and 'Keeper No-Go 8th December 2003
Queens injury woes continued with the news that Joe McAlpine could be out for about a month following his appendix operation at the weekend, however Joe is progressing well and hopes to be out of hospital tomorrow.

John Connolly bemoaning his bad luck said, "That's Joe sidelined now. What a spell we've had these past five weeks. Sean O'Connor was out for a lengthy spell, Steve Bowey missed a couple of games, we had others playing with niggling injuries and even Jim Thomson was suspended for a match. Add to that the fact that our number one 'keeper will be lucky if he plays again this season and it's little wonder that I'm really a bit sick at the moment".

The manager confirmed that the club won't be progressing the matter any further with trialist 'keeper Kris Robertson who played in the last two matches but will be soldiering on with John Dodds and Stuart Robertson meanwhile. However if any Queens supporters out there know of any experienced 'keeper available let us know by contacting the website.

Bill Goldie
Man of the Match 8th December 2003
Returning captain Steve Bowey came out top in the Internet Fan Club Man of the Match voting this week, just ahead of goal scorer Gary Wood who was himself just ahead of Eric Paton.

The full scores can be found via the Latest Report page and the Man of the Match link leads to the latest player of the season league table.
Club Shop Opening 6th December 2003
For the next three weeks the Club Shop at Palmerston Park will be open between 2.00 and 4.00pm. So make sure you get along and stock up on the latest Queens goodies. A new item that will hopefully be available this weekend is a special limited edition four miniature whisky or vodka set that commemorates the four trophies that Queens have won - the Bell's Cup, the Second Division Championship, the B Division Championship and the Qualifying Cup, the set is priced at £17.50 and is a real collectors item. There are also some new Dougie the Doonhamer fridge magnets at just £2.00 that will be a super stocking filler.
Inverness CT 4-1 Queens - Reaction 6th December 2003
After watching his team slip to their third successive defeat John Connolly wasn't the happiest person on the planet as he spoke to the website as the team bus headed back down the A9.

"It will be a long way home" he retorted, "it should have been all over by half time. We made unbelievable chances out there today, we could well have walked in at the interval three goals up and that's not exaggerating. At 2-1 down we had another great opportunity to pull back to level but never even hit the target. They had five good chances and netted four - we had five good chances and scored once. That was the difference between the teams. Our chances were actually better ones and had their striker had them we would have been well beaten by half-time.

"We came in 1-0 up at the interval but just as we did against Clyde a fortnight ago we allowed them to score two early goals in the second half. Their second goal was again a goal keeping error and I've got to admit that we have a major problem there. Having said all that we've got to accept that Caley Thistle are the form team at the moment having scored nineteen goals in their last five games. They have better quality players, several of them having played in the Premier League last season and they have the strength in depth required for this league.

"However all the other top sides only drew today and it's still tight at the top. We play Brechin City at home next Saturday and a win would see us back in the mix". So it's not all doom and gloom.

Joe McAlpine was rushed to hospital from the team hotel suffering from suspected appendicitis.. Joe has now undergone an operation and is progressing well, but that's us another player down.

Bill Goldie
Reserves Back on Track 5th December 2003
In tonight's reserve league match at Palmerston Queens beat St.Cuthbert Wanderers 4-1.

Jimmy Little netted in twenty minutes to give the Kirkcudbright side the lead but in thirty five minutes Emilio Jaconelli latched onto a Willie Gibson through ball and held off the centre half to slot home the equaliser.

Queens took the lead twenty minutes into the second half when Mark Whorlow scored from twenty five yards out and made it 3-1 five minutes later, Jaconelli firing home from a Liam McDougall cross. With ten minutes remaining Ross Beattie set up that man Jaconelli again and he netted for his hat-trick to give Queens a comfortable win.

Bill Goldie
Man of the Match 5th December 2003
Eric Paton produced the best performance of a disappointing night for the Doonhamers on Wednesday as the Internet Fan Club voted for him ahead of second place man David Bagan and third placed Alex Burke.

All of the other player scores can be found in the 'Latest Report' section and the player of the season league table has also been updated and is in the Man of the Match section.

Catch a shot of the penalty kick before it's on the TV click on the link below for:

David Gow's Fan's Eye View of the goal
Team News 5th December 2003
Queens set off this afternoon for the long trip north to Inverness. As usual the team will be stopping off tonight at Aviemore in preparation for what's going to be a very hard match. It's over five years since we last beat Caley Thistle on their home ground - that day the score was 2-0 with Tommy Bryce netting them both.

Commenting on the game John Connolly stressed, "Of course it's going to be very difficult. They're currently top of the table and in their last four games have knocked in fifteen goals. So we have a massive task ahead of us. We've just had a grueling midweek game on a very heavy pitch and what some people seem to forget is that some of the players were working from 7.00am to get finished in time then they had to travel to Dumfries and play for ninety minutes against a full-time side.

"Our injuries have all come at the wrong time with Colin Scott, Sean O'Connor and Steve Bowey currently injured. However we hope Bowser will be okay for Saturday - he was on the bench on Wednesday night but we didn't want to risk him on such a heavy ground. Sean O'Connor will travel with the party but we've not quite certain that he'll participate. Our trialist 'keeper Kris Robertson will be in the pool - apart from a slip up at the first goal I felt he played well against St.Mirren considering it was his first game for the club. Emilio Jaconelli and Willie Gibson won't be travelling - both will play for the reserves against St.Cuthbert Wanderers at Palmerston tonight.

"The rest of the month will be equally difficult. In our next four matches we meet the three promotion favourites, Caley Thistle, St.Johnstone and Falkirk - two of them away from home so it will be a testing period, but it's important we start winning again and keep up there with the top six".

Bill Goldie
Queens 1-2 Buddies - Reaction 3rd December 2003
For the first time this season Queens lost two league games on the trot and missed out on a golden opportunity to regain top spot in the table.

Said John Connolly, "We lacked commitment tonight and it's not often I've had to say that this season. Perhaps we got St.Mirren at the wrong time - there's just been a change of management and they seemed really up for it. We discussed with the players prior to kick-off what to expect so they were all well warned. They fought for every ball and battled very hard but we conceded two bad goals which made it easier for them.

"It was not a good result for us but in this league you can't give a team two goals of a start and expect to win. After we pulled one goal back from the penalty spot we threw bodies up trying for the equaliser. We did put them under pressure for a while but couldn't get that elusive second goal. It's a funny old game football but on the night the hungrier team won".

Asked about the new 'keeper - ex St.Mirren player Kris Robertson, John added, "The guy held his hands up and admitted he should have done better for their first goal but having said that he did make two brilliant saves. However we have him as a 'trialist' and can play him for three games if required so he'll be going up to Inverness with us on Saturday".

Commenting on the Emilio Jaconelli red card the manager confessed, "The guy just about cut Emilio in two, he retaliated with a light kick on the ankle and I actually thought it was the St.Mirren player who was going to be sent off.

"We've a few testing weeks ahead of us now so we'll all have to buckle down and get back in the winning groove again."

Bill Goldie
Team News 1st December 2003
Saturday's postponement has certainly proved a vital respite for Queens with most of the casualties now available for the match against St.Mirren.

Brian Reid, Gary Wood and Steve Bowey, who were all doubtful on Saturday are now hoping to be fit while David Bagan is fast recovering from a flu virus and will also be in the pool.

John Connolly is still looking for a 'keeper as a replacement for Colin Scott and could have someone come Wednesday.

Two players have been released, Craig Coates and recent signing Tony Ross.

Remember that kick-off for the game on Wednesday is 7.45pm.

Bill Goldie
Buddies Match Details 30th November 2003
The league match postponed yesterday versus St.Mirren has been confirmed as rearranged for Wednesday 3rd December with a 7.45pm kick-off.

A victory against the managerless Paisley side would see us regain top spot in the league and set up what without doubt would be the 'match of the day' in the first division next Saturday as we travel to Inverness who currently sit at the top of the league.

So let's ensure that the side get the support that they often recognise as being so crucial and get everyone to Palmerston on Wednesday to help us regain the league lead.
Lights On 29th November 2003
Remember that you can catch up with the Queens players and John Connolly as they turn on the Dumfries Town Centre Christmas lights tomorrow night. So be at the Midsteeple between 4.30 and 5.30pm to catch the big switch on.
Chance to go back top this week 29th November 2003
With today's match being called off owing to a waterlogged pitch Queens dropped to fifth place in the table. But it's not nearly as bad as it looks for a win against St.Mirren on Wednesday night would see us regain top spot.

Said John Connolly, "It's unbelievable how tight this league is with only two points separating the top six teams. However there's now a definite gap opened between the top sides and the bottom four, so it's important we hang in there with the leading pack.

"The results today went more or less as expected, perhaps Falkirk losing 2-0 to Clyde was a bit of a surprise but Falkirk have been playing better away than at their adopted home, Ochilview.

"I'm sure the fans were disappointed at the postponement today but if you'd seen the park at two o'clock it was like a lake. There's no way you could play football on that and that was proven true with the match at Gretna abandoned after only eighteen minutes.

"The call-off perhaps worked in our favour since three or four players, big Sean, Colin Scott and Bowser would definitely have missed out. Others were nursing minor knocks and flu symptoms so it gives us an extra four days breathing space to get them fit.

"Despite the atrocious conditions we did have a full squad training session this afternoon. It was very difficult but it was important we put in a shift with the St.Mirren game rescheduled for Wednesday night and a long trip to Inverness in front of us at the weekend.

"So here's hoping for a good turnout at Palmerston on Wednesday - your support is greatly appreciated by us all".

Bill Goldie
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