Friday 29th March, 2019 at 2:58pm
It’s a trip to Cappielow Park for Partick Thistle this Saturday as they look to return to winning ways with a victory against Greenock Morton. The Jags spent most of the last week in Tenerife making use of warm weather training facilities as they prepare for the hugely important final seven games of the season.
The Jags will be looking to put right the wrongs of their last visit to Cappielow when they were handily beaten by the Ton in their heaviest defeat of the season. Gary Caldwell spoke to ptfc.co.uk ahead of the fixture, starting by recapping the squad’s time away in Spain:
“It was a fantastic opportunity for us. Being able to change the environment and work on things out there was great. Also, to have the boys together 24/7 was brilliant to help build relationships and a team spirit because we have so many new faces.
“We were able to focus completely on training and being able to work in ideal conditions on things that needed working on. Overall, the boys are refreshed and ready to give their all for the three points this weekend.”
Coming into the game against Morton, Thistle sit three points clear of bottom side Alloa and five behind the Ton so Gary knows that this game is not only a chance to move further away from 10th but also a good opportunity to pull Morton back into the mix.
“Every game is a massive one now and each one will have huge implications as far as the league table is concerned, this one is no different. A win for us puts pressure on everyone around us and, at the end of the day, that’s all we can focus on; winning our games.”
Looking back to Thistle’s last trip to Greenock, Caldwell doesn’t feel like that result should affect the team’s mentality coming into this weekend’s game as there will be a very different look to the squad this time round.
“It’s a completely different set of boys that we have now so I don’t think they need to look back to that game. It’s not a feeling that anyone that was there that day wants to have again because it hurt. Those days are always going to be difficult but we have to leave those memories behind us and try to replace them with happier ones from this Saturday.”
We finished by asking Gary for an update on the fitness of the squad going into the weekend.
“We’re almost at full availability. Everyone who went out to Tenerife trained fully and is available but unfortunately Lewis Mansell didn’t travel. He was feeling ill after the Inverness game and had to stay behind but he’ll be ready to play as well, thankfully.
“Tam O’Ware was training with us on the grass in Tenerife which is great. He managed to do some passing drills and that sort of thing so we’ll continue to build his training up. Hopefully next week he’ll be able to do some contact stuff and from there we can move towards getting him a reserve game.”
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