Queen of the South got 2014 at Palmerston off to a winning start as they ran out deserved 3-1 winners over Alloa Athletic in the Scottish Championship.

The Doonhamers started with an attacking 4-4-2 formation and their positivity was rewarded as Michael Paton opened the scoring after 29 minutes before Gavin Reilly capped an excellent half with a well-taken goal 5 minutes later.  Derek Lyle made it 3-0 on 56 minutes from close range before Ross Caldwell netted a consolation after 62 minutes.

Queens manager Jim McIntyre said: “We got an end product today and we created plenty.  I thought we were very good and we had to handle a lot of pressure in the second half so I was pleased with the back four and the other boys who came back to help out.

“We know our home form hasn`t been great in the first half of the season.  It was something we had spoken about and we were keen to make amends and start the new year well so I`m delighted because Alloa are a difficult team to break down.  They came and sat in to frustrate but I thought we moved the ball very well and got our full-backs high and passed it well.  We tried to get Russell and Paton between their lines and at times we were trying to force balls through the middle.  I thought the best way was to get down the sides and eventually our patience paid off.

“The team was set out to attack which it always is.  I`ve got to laugh when people say that `he’s only gone with one up front` but when you actually look at it when we`ve been playing 4-2-3-1 and 4-3-3 and the three behind the one are all strikers so you`re going for the game – there`s no doubt about that.”

Michael Paton continued his recent good form with a goal and an assist in an impressive first half.

He said: “I thought we were on top form, we pressed them really high like the manager wanted us to.  We started with two up top and started playing.  I got myself a goal and once we got that first goal it looked like we were going to go on and score a couple more which we did and we deserved the win today.

“We reacted from last week – it was a sore one we took at Hamilton.  Our home form hasn`t been that great so to get an early goal and push on and perform like we did for the full game was tremendous.  We showed what we can do and we can start pushing up the league.” 

The victory pushes Queens further from the danger zone with a seven point gap between them and Cowdenbeath in ninth and brought them to within five points of Raith in fourth.

Manager Jim McIntyre is keen to see a better performance from his side in the second half of the season to see them push towards the play-off places.

He said: “We`ve got to make sure that we keep gaining, keep climbing, keep picking up points and being a wee bit more consistent.  The half-time report for the season was that we have to do better and try to get more consistency to our play.  That`s the aim but it`s such a difficult thing to do in a tight league like this when any team is capable of beating any other team.”