Arbroath suffered their second successive defeat against their closest rivals at Cliftonhill on Saturday, but Gayfield boss Allan Moore remained upbeat with his outfit still top of League Two.
Rovers went in front after 10 minutes when the hugely impressive Mark McGuigan burst down the right and cut the ball back for Marc McKenzie, who timed his run into the box to perfection, to drill the ball low past Arbroath’s on loan goalkeeper Marc McCallum, who was making his debut.
Adam Hunter had the ball in the net for Arbroath after 20 minutes, but it was ruled offside. But the equaliser was only delayed by 11 minutes when Scott McBride netted his fourth of the season with a stunning left foot free-kick from 20-yards, which flew into the top right hand corner of the net.
Arbroath came close to taking an interval lead when Paul McManus took a return pass from Kevin Buchan in 41 minutes, but goalkeeper Neil Parry, at full stretch, pushed the ball to his left.
John Gemmell had the ball in the net for the Coatbridge side after 68 minutes, but it was ruled offside. It was a warning that Arbroath failed to heed and in 79 minutes the same player struck again, this time it didn’t just count, but proved to be the winner.
Substitute Josh Mullin broke down the right and his cross to the back post found Gemmell unmarked to knock the ball home from six yards.
Moore said: "I couldn't see us losing the game at any stage and I'm disappointed that we did. We got caught with a sucker punch, but if you don't defend your box well enough then you are going to lose goals. It was dogged with two evenly matched teams, but I felt we had the upper hand.
"We were pressing that much in the second half I was worried we would get caught on the counter and that's what happened. I was disappointed we didn't put enough crosses into the box to create enough chances for our strikers. Neither of the goalkeepers had much to do, but I couldn't see Albion Rovers scoring.
"We got off to a bad start but we recovered really well and I felt we dominated the rest of the first half. Unfortunately we've lost another three points but the good thing is we are still top of the league and still got three point cushion. We will worry about it when we are six points behind."
Moore added: "Gemmell takes stick off everyone, but he puts the ball in the back of the net and does what he's good at and was there when it mattered. That's what strikers do. That's what he's paid for. Unfortunately the last couple of weeks our strikers haven't been doing that.
"Hopefully we can get three points against Clyde next week and with Albion and Queen's Park playing each other something has to give."