Saturday 19th May, 2018 at 3:48pm
Paul McGinn knows the players have their final chance to keep Thistle in the Ladbrokes Premiership as they look to turn round a 2-1 first leg deficit on Sunday.
McGinn has urged the fans to get behind the team and together make that happen. The fans turned out on Thursday and the defender is hoping for some more great backing.
Speaking to ptfc.co.uk he said: “The fans travelled through in their numbers on Thursday and we disappointed them. They have every right to be annoyed with how we played, we know we weren’t good enough. However, hopefully on Sunday they can unite behind us.
“We have one last big push and the fans are important to that, everyone together can get us the result we need.”
McGinn knows the performance on Thursday wasn’t good enough but is thankful for the chance to put things right on Sunday.
“We weren’t good enough on Thursday. We didn’t play how we should have but luckily we are still in the game. Considering how badly we played we are still in the tie, it’s still there to play for and we’ve still got the opportunity to save the season.”
Paul knows what the team need to do, play the Partick Thistle way.
“We need to use being at home to our advantage, we have played much better at home this season barring one or two games and we need to make sure we go out and perform.
“The pitch is great which will hopefully let us play the football we know we need to play. It’s important we play our football. Livingston have a style and it’s very effective but it’s not us and not how we should be playing.
“The pitch is fantastic, the groundsmen have done a great job and we have to go out and use that to our advantage, use the big pitch to pass the ball and create opportunities.
“We fell into the trap the other night of playing a similar style to Livingston which really doesn’t suit us. We know we need to get the ball down and use the large Firhill pitch to our advantage on Sunday.”
While McGinn knows fight and effort is important, there is much more needed according to the Thistle number sixteen.
“We have to be clever, we have to put everything into it but we can’t get dragged into a battle. We have to make sure we play football, we have to create chances but make sure we keep the door closed at the back.
“We have to make sure we fight for everything but we have to put heart and head into it. Just one isn’t good enough, both will need to be there.”
The importance of the game is not lost on McGinn and he wants the squad to draw on the performance at Dundee on the last game of the season.
“We know just how massive Sunday is, especially after the result on Thursday it just makes it that much bigger.
“It’s the biggest game I’ve played in for quite a while.
“We went out against Dundee and got what we needed that day, we need to go into this game with exactly the same mentality and make sure we get what we need to.”
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