St Cuthbert Wanderers boss Josh Gardner reckons the end of the season may be coming just too soon for his players.
The Kirkcudbright side picked up their third win in four games on Saturday when they thumped Nithsdale Wanderers 5-0.
But the good form can’t continue much longer – as Saints have only a handful of games left.
Gardner said: “I think the form we’re hitting is maybe just a bit too late for us but with a new group of players it was always going to take time.
“Since the return of the year the results have been far better – I think this season has proven we can compete at this level and can more than compete at this level against the better teams.
“For me the disappointing aspect is we’ve only shown it in spells or moments in games.
“It’s encouraging, if you got to this stage of the season and it was still the way it was at the start you’d be worried and having to make wholesale changes, but just now it doesn’t seem like that. It just took a while to click into place. We just need to keep going and keep pushing on.”
Cammy Shaw opened the scoring on Saturday with a penalty and he got a second before the break.
Nick Mullen bagged a second half brace with Darrel Wilson also on target.
Gardner said: “It was pretty comfortable – we got the penalty and had another couple of chances, then in the second half we came out and kept the foot on the gas and got another three goals.
“We saw the game out really comfortably. If you asked the players they’d probably be gutted they didn’t score more but it’s five goals without reply.
“The only down side is Kane Paton came off with an injury and it looks as if it’s a bad tear on his hamstring, which I imagine will rule him out for the rest of the season.”
Saints’ trip to Wigtown on Tuesday was rained off and their packed schedule continues this weekend when they travel to title challengers Lochar Thistle.
Gardner said: “It was a tight game when we played them last time, they scored two goals we felt we should have done a lot better with.
“It’s another top team in the league we can compete with - we’ve been competing with Lochar, Creetown, Abbey Vale but they’ve maybe punished our daft errors. Other teams have made them but we’ve not punished them or made the most of when we’re on top of games.
