Kyle targets Diamond standard

“Airdrie are a good team, there is no doubt about that. As the manager says, if we finish above them this season we will be doing well.

Coming up against his former team for the first time Kyle Macdonald felt that it was an injustice not to win. With Rhys Breen netting in added time only for referee Grant Irvine to decide that there was a reason to disallow the goal, Kyle commented after the 1-1 draw with Airdrieonians:-

“It was disappointing especially with the goal that got chalked off at the end. Obviously the ref has made the decision and we just need to accept that. I think that you can tell by the reaction of the boys, normally if the ref gives a decision people are okay with it and nothing much is said. I normally stay out of it and I’m not too sure from where I was. It looked like a perfectly good goal but listen he has made the decision and we just have to accept it.

“It is tough to take, we created a lot of chances in the game and as we have been saying for a few weeks now, we need to start taking our chances and if we had done that today we would have won the game. Listen we are still unbeaten and we will move on to next week.”

Just three days after his 21st birthday Kyle Macdonald signed a two and a half year deal with Dunfermline on 14th January last year. He was loaned back to Airdrieonians in January this year but this season under James McPake he has been given a more attacking role and Saturday’s match was his second league start. Kyle has delivered a good number of crosses when involved and described that as a big part of his game:-

“Playing in that wing back position it is important that I put good balls into the box especially when we are playing with two strikers up top. Obviously Todorov and McCann when he came on, Kev and Wiggy when he is back fit - we have good strikers in the team who can finish. If I can help by putting balls into the box for them to finish, then hopefully on another day we can score more than we did today.”

Kyle’s only goal for the Pars was away to Partick Thistle in the opening game of the season but this term he has had his chances:-

“They don’t come often enough. It is just maybe why I’m not scoring as many. I definitely should have scored at least a couple of goals by now. We will just move on to next week and if I get the chance next week hopefully I will stick it away.”

The goal conceded to Airdrieonians was the first that the Pars have leaked in this league campaign and Kyle was disappointed with his inability to reach a strong cross from the right that dropped beyond him for Justin Devenny to tee up Adam Frizzell who rifled in the 78th minute equaliser:-

“I will need to see the run earlier. It is maybe part of not playing or a bit of fatigue setting in to myself. The ball has just gone over my head and he has managed to cut it back, fair play to the boy it is good strike.

“Airdrie are a good team, there is no doubt about that. As the manager says, if we finish above them this season we will be doing well. Credit to Airdrie but in terms of myself I do wish that I had done better and that would maybe have capped off a better performance from myself.

“I was there myself for the last five months of last season and they were a very good team, a much different team from the first time that I was there. They like to play the ball about and you could see today that they were probably our toughest test so far this season.

“We matched them, more than matched them and we felt like we could have gone away with three points today. I think that is a positive to take from today to take into next week.”

Agreeing to the suggestion that Airdrieonians could be the team challenging for the title come the end of the season, Kyle closed:-

“I think I said that a couple of weeks ago in an earlier interview. We beat FC Edinburgh 3-0 but you don’t get many games where you win by three or four clear goals in this league.

“Every team is tight, every team is hard to beat, most teams defend their box well so when you are winning games like we have, it is going to be by one or two goals and we are going to need to be good defensively. We have been and that is the first goal that we have conceded. It is a good start but hopefully we can get back to winning ways next week.”

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