Friday 28th October, 2016 at 1:53pm
Daniel Devine is looking forward to facing St Johnstone. After the 2-0 win over Dundee the defender and the rest of the squad can’t wait to get back out on the pitch.
After recording the victory in the City of Discovery, Devine is hoping for a repeat just down the road in Perth.
Speaking to ptfc.co.uk he said: “The boys are buzzing after the result against Dundee. It’s been a long time coming, it’s about time we got the right result to match our performances.
“We’ve all got a spring in our step and are all now looking forward to Saturday. However, we need to make sure we continue to work hard and don’t get too carried away.”
After a number of late heartbreaks Danny admits it’s released a little bit of the pressure that had been sitting on the shoulders of the players.
“It’s a weight off the shoulders to be sure. The boys all know the quality we have in the squad and how well we can play. We have put in the performances but football isn’t about that, especially in this league, you need to grind out results and we’ve managed to do that against Dundee.
“We want to look up the table instead of down and we can start to do that but we have to continue with a win against St Johnstone.”
As well as the three points, Devine was delighted to record the second clean sheet of the season.
“A clean sheet was important, we haven’t had one since the start of the season and you can build a lot on a clean sheet. We performed excellently as a team and really defended from the front so we need to do that again if we are to make it two wins in a row on Saturday.”
With the switch to 3-5-2 looking like it has worked so far, the defender is enjoying playing the slightly different formation.
“I’m enjoying playing in it, I think it’s working really well. I’ve played in a three a handful of times before and it works. It suits the players we have and we have the personnel to play it effectively. You can see from the last two games that it’s worked well and we have to find consistency now while keeping up that level of performance.”
The main downside to the victory over Dundee was the injury to Ryan Scully. Thorsten Stuckmann is likely to come in and Danny knows the defence can rely on the big German keeper.
“It’s obviously disappointing to lose Ryan. He’s performed really well since he came in for Tomas, he’s not put a foot wrong and pulled off a number of excellent saves, He’s really kept us in games at times. I am disappointed for him especially, he was just beginning to get a run of games and establish himself in the team, but that’s football and I’m sure he will come back stronger.
“Thankfully we’ve got Thorsten to come in, the boys know he’s more than capable of doing a good job. I played with him at Preston and he’s a massive unit. He’s a big presence in the box and he will no doubt be wanting to make his presence felt on Saturday. We are more than comfortable with him coming in and it’s good to know we have him behind us.”
The first St Johnstone match was one of the low points of the season and Danny is hoping to atone for that on Saturday.
“We go into the game knowing we didn’t do ourselves justice in the first league game against St Johnstone. That does drive us there to go out and try and put that right. We know we can’t have a repeat and will be doing everything we can to get all three points and put things right.
“It’s a good chance to move ourselves further up the league. The league is so tight and there’s been some surprising results. All we can do is go out and win our football matches. If we do that then we will soon see ourselves further up the table.”
