Saturday 23rd February, 2013 at 9:27pm
[link:HOME], as always, caught up with manager Alan Archibald after yesterday’s game and he admitted that the victory, as welcome as it was, wasn’t pretty at time.
“The first half was definitely ugly. It wasn’t pretty at all in the first half. The pitch didn’t help things and Airdrie made it difficult for us but we didn’t get the tempo of the game up high enough. I spoke to the players before the game and we knew how Airdrie would play and I felt that individually and as a team we were poor in the first half. I know it is difficult with the pitch but our tempo was poor and our movement of the ball could have been a lot better. I thought that they addressed that in the second half and we started the second half a lot better.”
Alan continued;
“Their goalkeeper had a number of good saves in the second half and that came from our tempo. Once we lifted the tempo and moved the ball quick and early we managed to get support up to the strikers; that was the difference in the second half.”
The manager was pleased that his side kept another clean sheet.
“The plus points for the day were getting the three points and keeping another clean sheet. A wins a win and this is the business end of the season. I wouldn’t want too many wins like that though. We want still to win games by playing good passing football and we are still trying to do that.”
Yesterday’s win sets up a big week for us with two trips to Fife. Alan though isn’t thinking any further ahead than Tuesday’s game with Cowdenbeath.
“The first game at Cowdenbeath we know is going to be difficult as there has only been one goal in it any time we’ve played them this season. We’ll address this game first. We picked up a few knocks today, Paul Paton for example has tweaked his ankle, and the players will be in tomorrow and we’ll take a closer look then at who is injured and who isn’t and we’ll plan ahead for Tuesday night.”
Yesterday, in a frustrating game, the fans lived up to their tag of twelfth man and that was something that the manager, unprompted, was quick to pick up on.
“There’s a real sense of togetherness at the Club this season on and off the park. Today the fans were unbelievable. It wasn’t great at times but they stuck with us throughout the whole game. The singing started in the North Stand and spread to the Jackie Husband Stand and that was just fantastic. Everyone is really pulling together right now and that means a lot to us.”
