Not time to panic despite third successive National League Division 2 loss, says Falkirk's Kenny Grieve

Visiting Kirkcaldy narrowly got the better of Falkirk last Saturday at Sunnyside (Pictures by Alan Murray)

Falkirk’s director of rugby Kenny Grieve insists it isn’t time to panic after watching his side slump to a third successive defeat in the Arnold Clark National League Division 2 over the weekend.

A sensational second half comeback saw Kirkcaldy – who edged out Falkirk by a single point earlier in the campaign in Fife – recover from a 22-3 deficit at Sunnyside last Saturday to prevail 34-32 in what was another tightly-contested encounter between the sides.

Late drama saw the visitors’ Rory Brown score a last minute try under the posts – Falkirk were down to 14 men at the time after a yellow card – before Kirkcaldy skipper Fin Smith slotted the conversion.

And that loss follows on from previous defeats against GHK and Gordonians – with Stevie Leckie’s first XV rooted fifth in the table and 14 points off top spot after nine league outings.

Stevie Leckie’s first XV side have now lost three on the spin (Photo: Alan Murray)

"We keep making silly, unforced errors,” Grieve admitted. “We were in my eyes the better side but mistakes are costing us big time and that has been apparent over the past few games.

“High tackles are something we aren’t learning from – we need to drop our height. The teams we are playing against are getting easy yardage and it is getting them out of jail easily if we are at their 22.

“Giving away silly penalties isn’t on and the stuff is schoolboy-level. The annoying thing is when we are on it we play some cracking stuff and are really good to watch.

“We are forever good for scoring tries but we have some real defensive frailties at the moment. We need to address that and fix it.

“Errors are being compounded by errors. We are losing composure through doing daft things that we certainly don’t practice.”

Grieve also lamented Falkirk’s luck with injuries this season, with key players across the team struggling for fitness with knocks.

He also confirmed that prop Kevin Crainey was the next Sunnyside star to suffer a season-ending injury.

“We are missing our whole front row, we are missing a couple of centres too,” Grieve added. “We haven’t been at full strength all season. It has been a really unlucky season in that sense.

“Kevin Crainey for example was building fitness to come back and he played for our seconds over the weekend and broke his ankle with 20 seconds remaining. It is a bad fracture so we are talking about a season-ender.

“That happens though, when you are going through a good period you tend to avoid injuries and people pop up with bits of magic but when you are going through a tougher spell nothing seems to go your way.

“We are picking up too many niggles and the league is very attritional this season.”