Wednesday 12th August, 2015 at 3:19pm
Alan Archibald spoke to ptfc.co.uk shortly after the full time whistle in Inverness and we wondered if he considered it two points dropped or one gained.
“A bit of both I think. When you see the chances we created, we had the clearer cut opportunities but the game could have went either way. To be fair to John Hughes’ side they had a few chances and Tomas made a good couple of saves.
“I thought the defence played really well and I include Tomas inthat. His starting position was really good. Some of the long balls which Inverness played through, he dealt with brilliantly. I’m delighted with the clean sheet as well.
“I’m a greedy manager and I thought we deserved the three points with the way we created our chances.”
After a tame opening spell, Thistle imposed themselves on the game more in the second half and Archibald admits he was disappointed with the first half performance.
“I only saw glimpses of what we can do with the ball in the first half. The way we circulate and play It was maybe, seen on only two occasions that we did that in the first half. That was the disappointing thing and we said that at half time. That’s what
we are good at. We’re not good at playing the ball direct in behind the sides.
“In the second half the midfield gave our defence more options on the ball. We got our creative players like Steven Lawless into good areas to go and make things happen to us.”
Mathias Pogba had to be withdrawn early in the game and we wondered if it disrupted the flow of the game for the forward players.
“I’m not sure. It was a weird start of a game. We didn’t play well but we still created chances. Kris Doolan was fantastic. Hehad a chance early on, which maybe came too early for him but he still worked the goalkeeper.“
Steven Lawless came closest to scoring when his shot was tipped onto the bar early in the second half.
“I think we had one just before that where a stramash in the box which didn’t fall our way. There was a couple of occasion where it didn’t look like going our way. I’m really, really happy with the way we played and the way we created our chances, although we never managed to take them. We just didn’t manage the final pass on a couple of occasions tonight.”There were a couple of worrying scenes with players needing treatment in the game and Archibald was happy to clear up theinjury worries.
“Abdul has a bit of a knock, which he already had at half time. Mathias felt his hamstring go, so we took him off as a precaution. Hopefully it’s only a strain and he’ll be back soon.”
The attention turns to Kilmarnock on Saturday and Archibald is hoping his creative players are able to link up more effectively against them.
“I certainly hope so. David Amoo has to do more for the team to get on the ball. He never really affected play for us going forward although he did a lot of work going back. We need to get him more involved. Lawless and Doolan linked up really well. There’s a lot of positives to take from tonight.”
