GETTING that much awaited win over a top five side pleased Cowdenbeath boss Gary Bollan but he was quick to point out that there is a lot of work still to be done.

The win took Cowden on to 14 points, but there were also wins for Berwick Rangers, at Elgin, and Queen’s Park at home to Peterhead, so they are five off fifth place.

The gap over bottom side Albion Rovers is now ten points, but they have appointed former Hibs winger Kevin Harper as manager and they only lost by the odd goal in three to leaders Edinburgh City, so they may well improve and there is an important game at Coatbridge in three weeks time.

With Queen’s Park being involved in the Barrs Irn Bru Cup this Saturday Cowdenbeath’s game with Queen’s has been postponed until November 27 and it could have come at a better time.

Mr Bollan is disappointed that there is no league game this weekend: “After a good away performance it would have been good to play this Saturday but Queen’s are involved in a cup game so there is nothing we can do.

“We do have a Fife Cup game on Thursday in which we will look to keep the guys in action but it is not the same as a league match”.

The boss was really pleased with the way his team tackled the Annan challenge on Saturday: “The performance and result shows what we have in the dressing room.

“We knew that it would be a very hard game and in the first period we had to defend at our best to ensure we kept a clean sheet and Dave McGurn played very while the whole side defended well and there were a couple of good chances at the other end.

“In the second period we started to play some really good stuff and there were chances for us and it was an excellent piece of finishing by Kris Renton which gave us the lead.

“Getting in front is so important and we really worked so hard to ensure that we kept our noses in front.”

He used a three at the back set-up at Annan with Robbie Deas, David Marsh and Jason Talbot forming the barrier that thwarted many Annan attacks.

The manager was was happy with the way it worked: “We had to defend well in this game and Jason, Robbie and David (Deas and Marsh are pictured) were excellent, and when they did get through, Dave McGurn showed his worth with a couple of good saves.

“At the other end Kris Renton did excellently and his workrate has been phenomenal in the past three games and he took his goal well, then up popped Josh Skelly to finish well to tie things up late on.

“I was pleased for Josh and it augers well for the future.

“It was an excellent win over a top five side and we have to look to maintain that form when we play Brora Rangers in the Scottish C up in a fortnight and Queen’s Park a week on Tuesday week in the re-arranged league game.

“Our aim is to get well up the table and in to the top half if we can and hopefully we can build on the win at Annan.”

Cowden play East of Scotland League side Burntisland Shipyard in the Fife Cup on Thursday at Central Park with a 7.45pm start.

He concluded: “While we do not have a league game it is still good to have some sort of action this week and we will be using the full squad, apart from Robbie Deas, who is away with the Scotland 19s. It is great to see Robbie get this recognition for he is a really top quality young player who is making a great contribution every week for us.”