Saturday 6th February, 2016 at 3:42pm
Thistle boss, Alan Archibald, was visibly disappointed when he spoke to ptfc.co.uk shortly after his Thistle side were put out of the William Hill Scottish Cup by a late Dundee United goal.
“It’s certainly a very sore one to take, especially given the late goal. We were on the right end of one of those on Tuesday night but it’s never nice when a goal like that costs you a place in the next round of the cup.
“I don’t think either team really deserved to win that one to be honest. It looked like a draw all day and there wasn’t a lot of quality going forward for either team. I thought our defence was strong and played well right up until we conceded the goal. We gave the ball away in a bad area and, to be fair to United, they scored with a bit of real quality.”
Thistle changed their shape to play a three man defence but Archibald didn’t think that was the reason for the defeat.
“We changed the shape a bit today to combat the different way United have been playing. I thought the change helped us and allowed us to deal with their two boys up front but I was verydisappointed with how we were going forward as we never tested their goalkeeper enough.
“I thought we had built a bit of momentum just before we madethe changes but then it filtered away a bit and I think everyone was expecting a replay.
“The change in formation is something we are quite comfortable with. It’s something we can use as the boys adapted to it really well. We haven’t had a lot of time to work on it but I think we have the personnel to do it now. The key will be making sure we work on those forward areas as there wasn’t enough goal threat there.”
Although the defeat means the team’s full focus will now be onthe Ladbrokes Premiership Archibald didn’t try and hide how disappointed he was to be out of the cup.
“We have put a lot of negative records to bed in the last two or three seasons but we have never put a decent cup run together and that is something I really regret and want to improve. We don’t want to be known as a team who gets put out of these competitions early and we want to put our bad record in the knockout competitions to bed as soon as possible.
“It’s all very well us saying that but we’re now out of both the cups once again so we’ll have to wait until next season to have another go. It’s a real shame because I think we had a real chance this season. We can’t think about that now though and must focus on our next game which is Hearts in the Premiership.”
