Monday 21st October, 2019 at 10:47am
Steven Saunders was understandably delighted after Thistle’s 3-1 victory over Dundee at Dens Park.
The defender was solid in the first half as Thistle soaked up a lot of pressure before a superb second half performance and three late goals blew Dundee away and brought the three points back to Glasgow.
Speaking to ptfc.co.uk on the happy bus back down the road, Saunders feels it was an important win.
“It was a great win. I think the first thirty minutes we were poor, but I think after that we picked it up and we were fantastic in the second half.
“We got the goals near the end so it might look like we’ve snatched it but I think we were deserving of the win so I’m glad we got those goals at the end to take all three points.”
Saunders admits the opening spell of the game wasn’t good enough but the second half performance more than made up for the slow start.
“I think we gave them too much space to play in the first half and they were trying to play a lot of through passes however I thought we defended well on the whole although we were obviously disappointed in the goal that we lost.
“A win like that is always that bit more special, that third goal goes in and you know you’ve done it. It was a great feeling.”
It took until the 85th minute for Thistle to draw level through Kenny Miller before Shea Gordon added a second and Lewis Mansell a third to put the cherry on top.
Saunders did worry as the game went on that the goal wasn’t going to come but he knew the players The Jags have in the squad.
“As the game goes on you think it’s going to be one of those days, Gary Harkins hits the post with a header, and you wonder if the goals will come but we know what we have in the team.
“We have players who can score goals and players who can set them up so we still had belief, It shows that we are a team who will fight till the end, who will keep going until the final whistle and it shows what can happen when we do.
“The manager made the changes at half time and it worked. Shea was superb and got a goal and an assist, so he made a real impact.”
The Thistle number 43 gave a lot of credit to the fight and team spirit in the squad which was there in abundance.
“You’ve seen since the gaffer has come in what fight we have in this team. We are all giving it our all every time we step on that pitch. It might not always come off but we will always give it our all.
“It’s a massive result, any win in this league can move you up the table, it’s unfortunate other teams won but it bunches the league up. It’s so tight and we now need to go and win back to back league games and see where it takes us. We need to continue the run of form we are in.”
A more in depth video interview with Ian McCall is available to Jagzone subscribers now as well as Thistle players, Shea Gordon and Ryan Williamson – log in to view.
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Article Copyright © 2019. Permission to use quotations from this article online is only granted subject to appropriate source credit and hyperlink to ptfc.co.uk.
