Reaction

jim goodwin at firhill

Disappointed to our start in the second half the way we did , I thought the way the boys played in the first half was perfect, it was everything that we had spoken about in the build up to the game to allow Patrick’s three defenders at the back to have the ball and hit them on the break, we got in a couple of times on the counterattack, Jack Aitchison does perfect for his goal, it was a great finish so we were delighted at half-time as you can imagine but we knew about the threat Partick Thistle have with the quality of players they have and being able to bring off the bench. Credit to Gary Caldwell he made a brave double substitution at half-time and I thought Joe Cardle and Gary Harkins did really well.

Joe got his goal after a couple of minutes which is disappointing, because we spoke about the importance of the opening ten minutes of the Second half and how important it was to keep the score line at 1-0 and stay in the game and manage it properly, unfortunately we didn’t do that, Cardle drifted in to the middle of the pitch and got his shot away and that was one each.

The goals for me we lost were disappointing because we had been blocking shots and stopping crosses in the whole first half up until then, I don’t think Neilly had too many safes to make and the winning goal you just have to take your hat off sometime and give credit to Scott McDonald, when you are able to bring a player of that quality to your club then that’s what you get his sixth goal since he arrived he has been a really good signing for them.

We are disappointed because we would be disappointed to lose any game of football, but I did say to the players they can be very proud of the run they were on prior to the game, we are the only team in the league this season to win four games in a row, so we took a lot of credit for that but we will not get down in the dumps about this afternoon being 1-0 up a half-time we should take something from the game, but I have been there as a player too many times when you know 1-0 is not a comfortable lead, so we need to go again and it is still in our hands.

If you had offered me this situation at the start of the season with two games left we are three points off the bottom and need to go and win another game of football to stay in the division I would have snapped the hand off you. So we have Inverness CT and Ayr United coming up two games which we be extremely difficult games, but games we are more than capable of winning.

I can’t argue to much with the final result Partick were the better team on the day, we did really well in the first half but they were on top in second half which gives them a fighting chance now, it is a fantastic league, really entertaining and I think you will be doing well to find a more entertaining league this season – It’s still all to play for everybody’s still in the mix and there is still a lot of football to be played.