Williams - working on winning

“We are going to do everything that we can to get the win on Saturday. It will be a tough game, there is no doubt about that.

Pars keeper Owain Fôn Williams feels that it has been a decent week in training after the departure of Peter Grant:-

“It has been tough obviously, you can imagine what it is like when these things happen. We have been working towards the game on Saturday and we are looking forward to it.”

Owain has a coaching role at Dunfermline but he confirmed that his remit is still solely to look after the goalkeepers. Steven Whittaker and Greg Shields will take charge of the team for Saturday’s home match against Morton and Greg has talked about having in depth conversations between coaching staff and players.

The 34 year old Welshman subscribes to the need for meetings to get information over:-

“You want everyone to be singing from the same hymn sheet. If anyone has a question then it is better to ask a question than for it to happen and then ask the question if that makes any sense. That goes for anything but it is just the same with football.

“That is why we have these conversations or meetings, to put things in place and then you go out on the training pitch and execute what Steven and Shieldsie put in front of the boys.”

Initially Owain was signed on loan from Hamilton Academical in January 2020 and then the move to Dunfermline was made permanent in August 2020. He knows how important it is to move on from the twelve league matches without a win and concentrate on beating Morton on Saturday.

“It is a big game isn’t it? There is no hiding that. We all know that Greenock Morton are coming here to East End Park, our home and our house. You don’t let someone come to your house and take three points away from you.

“We are going to do everything that we can to get the win on Saturday. It will be a tough game, there is no doubt about that. Every game in this league is tough and you will never play the same game again. It is so competitive but it is down to us really to show what we are about on Saturday. That is what we work on throughout the week and hopefully that will be the kick start for our first three points.”

The players are the ones ultimately who will earn a victory and Owain stressed the need to give 100 per cent and keep the mood high:-

“Realistically as players all you can do is look at yourself in the mirror and apply yourself the best you possibly can, whether you are an older pro or a young professional starting off. All you can do is each morning give your best and it is only going to benefit the team if you do that and apply yourself right.

“It is very important to get the balance right because it would be so easy right now to be all doom and gloom in some ways. But it is very important to keep the morale good, to keep the boys sharp. To be positive, as positive as can be and try and get the guys as confident and as happy as you possibly can because we have heard it before.

“People always say that a happy player is a confident player, is a good player so that is what we need. When we walk out on that pitch, whether it is this Saturday or next Saturday whenever it is, we need to be there feeling good, playing good.”

Owain returned to the first team on 11th September and has had three shut outs in the nine league matches that he has played in. Only three games were lost but the lack of wins has cost the team points and league places. That disappointment is shared by fans and players alike but Owain was philosophical about the previous results especially after coming so close to winning many of them:-

“You can use that as an experience so that it doesn’t happen again. What has been has been, we cannot do anything about that. No one can do anything about the past, we can only look forward.

“Looking forward, we don’t want to be where we are in the league so we have to roll our sleeves up and give it everything that we have got to be in a position that we want to be in. That starts on Saturday.”

When Dunfermline have gone ahead in matches they have been accused of sinking back to defend leads and Owain pointed out that there are different ways of stopping that:-

“Your first attacker is your goalkeeper and your first defender is your centre forward. It is not the back line’s fault or the centre forward’s fault, it is a team thing and it is about knowing in a game how to box a game off.

“There are different ways of doing that, it is just finding a way of closing a game off and seeing a game through.”

Could it be a mental thing?

“It can be a lot of things. Losing a goal after being ahead can be for a variety of different factors. The last two games haven’t been the same, the issues have been different. The timing of the goals have been different as well but there are a variety of things that can affect losing a lead. Sometimes you just have to work it out as a team.”

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