Tuesday 26th July, 2016 at 10:30pm
With another Betfred Cup victory pushing the side closer to the last 16, ptfc.co.uk caught up with manager Alan Archibald shortly after the full time whistle blew on the 4-1 victory over Stenhousemuir.
I’m delighted with the victory. We came here focussed on getting the three points and we’ve managed to gather them with a bit of style.
“I thought our first half display was very, very good. We were dominant and created a number of chances throughout the first 45 minutes. We were slightly poorer in the second half but we still created chances and managed to get a couple of goals late on to add to the scoreline.”
The manager changed his strikeforce for the third time in the group phase giving Mathias Pogba his first start of the tournament and the striker repaid his faith with a goal.
“We changed it up again after going with Doolan and Azeez in previous games. Mathias came off the bench on Saturday and set up two goals to help us get three points and it was good to see him on the scoresheet tonight. He had a number of opportunities in front of goal, which is always great to see from your strikers.
“We’ve had seven different players scoring in the Betfred Cup which is great to see the goals spread around the team. We know we didn’t have enough scorers last year and for a number of the squad to start the season on the goal trail can only be a good thing. Hopefully a few of them kick on and score plenty more over the course of the season.”
With a number of changes to the side, the gaffer is keen to give minutes to as many players as possible.
“Danny Devine missed out tonight through injury, but that gave David Syme a chance to get 90 minutes under his belt. We’ve rotated the squad from middle to front to give players minutes and I think you can see that it is paying off with a number of good performances from different players.”
There were a few nervous moments around Ochilview as Stenhousemuir got themselves back into the game before David Amoo’s strike restored Thistle’s two goal cushion.
“I said before the game that Stenhousemuir would get, at least, one chance. Every team gets an opportunity to score. The disappointing thing is that it has come from a corner kick. We won’t get away with that when we get into Premiership action, so we have to learn from it quickly.”
Qualification from the group stage is very close but the gaffer knows the job isn’t quite done yet.
We’re not through to the next round yet, but we are very, very close. We play Queen’s Park on Saturday and we’ll be looking to round off with a win. If we get another three points at Firhill then we know we’ll be guaranteed to be a seed in the next round.
