GUS MacPHERSON has expressed his delight at dumping form-side Dumbarton out of the Petrofac Training Cup.

An extra-time goal from substitute Joe Bradley was enough to give the Spiders the win over their Championship opponents.

MacPherson said afterwards that he is happy with the work being put in across his entire squad.

“Any time when you progress against a team from a higher league you’re happy,” he said.

“But the most important thing was the work ethic of our group.

“They fought for everything, and worked extremely hard.

“We changed our system to try and cope with Dumbarton, and it worked.

“We made four or five changes and it certainly didn’t weaken us.

“Everybody played their part in the win, and that’s the purpose of having these guys on the bench.

“Some of them played ever so well against Clyde on Saturday, but we felt the need to make those changes.

“We had that formation against Annan and we played very well, although we didn’t win.

“We then changed it to deal with what Clyde had to offer, so we know that we’ve got options depending on who we’re playing.

“On other occasions it might not work, but it worked tonight and the boys are delighted.”

MacPherson’s troops had a huge let-off in stoppage time as Garry Fleming missed a penalty to win the tie for the Sons.

MacPherson insists though that it would have been a travesty if Dumbarton had snatched the game with almost the final kick.

“It would have been an injustice if we had lost at that time after putting so much into the game,” MacPherson said.

“But when you’ve got someone of Fleming’s quality from 12 yards having a free shot at goal then you certainly expect them to score.

“We rode our luck on that one, but going into extra-time you saw from the changes we tried to be positive and win the game in that period of time, and it’s worked for us.”

Bradley climbed off the bench to net the winner 5 minutes into extra-time, and they held out for a nervy last 25 minutes to claim the win.

MacPherson praised his players’ attitude, and referee Nick Walsh, who over-ruled his assistant in the build-up to Bradley's goal.

“The referee for our goal made a fantastic decision, because the assistant put his flag up for offside and it was quite clearly the Dumbarton player that played it forward,” he said.

“To be fair, the referee identified that and told everybody to play on.

“We scored early, meaning we had to hang on for a long time, but the boys worked hard for each other and defended very well when they had to.”

Queen’s Park now face a trip to Arbroath on Saturday as they look to build on a positive week.

MacPherson admitted that the victories over Clyde last weekend and Dumbarton have given the squad a confidence boost.

“Everybody’s got a clean bill of health for the weekend, and we can go again.

“It’s another tough game against Arbroath away from home.”