ALLOA star Jamie Longworth admitted he was relieved to have finally scored his first goal for the club after opening his account during Saturday’s victory over Stenhousemuir.

The former Stranraer forward netted the Wasps’ third goal as they saw off their local rivals at the Indodrill Stadium and says he hopes he has done enough to keep his place in player-manager Jim Goodwin’s starting line-up.

Longworth told Advertiser Sport: “It’s nice to finally get my name on the scoresheet because I was struggling to remember what it was like to score a goal!

"When I have been coming off the bench I have been doing OK but when you are surrounded by players like Greig Spence, Jordan Kirkpatrick, Kevin Cawley and Iain Flannigan it is hard to break into the team.

"Coming off the bench and not scoring is maybe not the best when I am trying to get back into the team.

"Flanny will hopefully be back against Queen of the South but I’m hoping I have done enough to keep my place in the team.

"If not, I will come off the bench and try and get myself back into the manager’s plans again.

“It’s great to have so much competition for places. Stevie Hetherington is still to come back and young Adam Martin has come in and done really well.

"We had Luke Donnelly coming off the bench too. Between now and the end of the season, it is going to be a team effort.

"We want to challenge for the title. Of course it is disappointing when you are not starting but when you have players of the quality we have, it is understandable. We will go through to the end of the season as a team.”

Longworth believes that Saturday’s victory was the perfect response after Alloa were left frustrated by Albion Rovers in their previous fixture.

He said: “First and foremost, it was very important that we got over the disappointment of last week. I think everyone would agree that we deserved the three points against Albion Rovers but it just wasn’t to be.

"Despite that, we had a good week in training and we were confident going into the game. It is good to have got the win and the most pleasing thing is that we won comfortably in the end.”

The striker and his team-mates now have the chance to reach the Irn Bru Cup semi-finals when they take on Queen of the South and although he is expecting a tough encounter, he reckons the Wasps will travel to Palmerston full of confidence.

Longworth added: “Queen of the South will be a tough game. They are a good side who are near the top of the Championship on merit.

"It will be a challenge but we have played a lot of full-time teams and certainly not disgraced ourselves, so we will go there, play our own game and hopefully come back up the road after it with a semi-final place.”