Monday 20th January, 2020 at 10:54am
Darian MacKinnon made his Jags debut in the heart of midfield as Partick Thistle put on a hard-working display but ultimately went out of the William Hill Scottish Cup to Celtic at the Energy Check Stadium at Firhill on Saturday evening.
The new recruit occupied a sitting role in the home side’s engine room and says the team were left proud but frustrated at the full-time whistle.
Speaking to ptfc.co.uk he said: “We’re disappointed after that one. We’ve given a good account of ourselves; Celtic dominated the possession, but we feel we had chances in there.
“We’re not happy about the goals we’ve lost to them so we’re still not happy with the result and feel we could have got something more.”
Despite not progressing to the next round MacKinnon feels there is a lot that the team can take from the way they performed.
“I think we can certainly take a lot of positives from the game. When we had the ball, we were good with it and I think we defended well against a very good side. However, there is no point playing like that against Celtic and not putting the same type of performance and work rate in again next week in the league.”
Darian was making his first appearance in red and yellow and it was one that he thoroughly enjoyed.
“I loved being out there. I’ve not played much in the last four months, but the manager spoke to me on Friday and told me to go out and give him 60 minutes. I said no bother and went out and gave it my all for the hour.
“It was fantastic having two players like Stuart Bannigan and Reece Cole in front of me. It reminds me of when I had Ali Crawford in front of me at Hamilton, I just win the ball back, give it to one of them and they go do their thing, they were both excellent tonight and I’m looking forward to building more of a partnership.”
The Jags number 16 is now looking forward to next week’s trip to Arbroath and he knows the squad will need to bring the same intensity to Gayfield Park if they want to get all three points.
“We’ll work hard again ahead of the Arbroath game; we have to build on the performance and get the three points we need to start moving us up the table.
“We know it won’t be easy, there are no easy games in this league, Arbroath have done really well this season and it’s a tough place to go but I believe if we go in fully prepared with the same sort of mindset then we can get the three points.”
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