Thursday 14th October, 2021 at 12:08pm
It’s a second Friday night clash in a row for Partick Thistle this week as they take on Hamilton Accies in league action for the first time since 2018. Ian McCall’s side will be hoping to bounce back at the Fountain of Youth Stadium following a disappointing 2-0 loss to Queen of the South in the SPFL Trust Trophy last time out. For left-back Stephen Hendrie, who made his Thistle debut in that Dumfries defeat, it will be familiar territory this Friday as he returns to the place where he made his professional debut back in 2011. He spoke to ptfc.co.uk ahead of the game.
“I’m looking forward to facing Accies because it’s a massive game for us. We need to go there and win the game there’s no doubt about it. Getting the three points would be massive and we have an opportunity to put our marker down and that will send out a message saying that we’re up for it and we can fight for one of the top four places.
“Hamilton are always up for it and they give everything for the team. They’re a hard team to play against and I know they’ll be right up for it when we play them.”
The Hamilton match comes seven days after a cup defeat for Thistle. The 2-0 loss against Queen of the South saw the Firhill side drop out of this season’s battle for the SPFL Trust Trophy but, despite the loss, Stephen still thinks there were positives to take away from the performance.
“Obviously, I’m gutted we’re out of the cup, but I was happy to get 90 minutes under my belt from a personal perspective. I thought we played reasonably well in spells during the match, and I thought we had the edge on them certainly in the first half.
“We had a good few chances throughout the game that we should put away and that would’ve put us in prime position. We didn’t take those chances though and they came up the other end and scored a great individual goal.”
Thistle were chasing a late equaliser when Stephen’s pass to Jamie Sneddon was intercepted by Ally Roy and the Queen of the South forward slotted in a late second for the Dumfries side.
“The second goal could have been avoided. I’ve tried to pass it back to Jamie so he can get us back up the pitch to grab a leveller and unfortunately there’s just not enough on the pass and they’ve latched onto it and scored a second. I thought we were the better side over the course of the game but having said that we need to put away our chances.
“It felt good to get a full game under my belt. The last 15 or 20 minutes I was starting to feel it a bit but I was expecting that because it’s the first full game I’ve had in five months, so I was pleased to complete the full 90 minutes and hopefully I’ll get opportunities to get more minutes going forward.”
Exclusive video interviews with Thistle assistant manager Neil Scally and Ross Docherty will be available for JagZone subscribers to watch today – log in to view.
JagZone subscribers will be able to tune in to live audio commentary for our clash with Hamilton Accies, starting at 7:15pm – click here to tune in.
We’ll have extended highlights and a full game replay of the fixture on JagZone following the game.
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