If a week is a long time in football, then a month-and-a-half is almost an eternity. And an awful lot can change in that time.
Just ask Kris Doolan. It wasn’t so long ago that a 1-0 defeat away to Hamilton piled pressure on the Partick Thistle manager, with the loss extending the Jags’ poor run of form on the road. The same old problems that had dogged them for the campaign up until then reared their head once more: chief among them, an inability to fashion clear-cut opportunities.
At that point, Thistle had lost every away game they had played in the William Hill Championship and had mustered a solitary goal on their travels. But since that dreary defeat in Lanarkshire, it is an altogether different story.
Now, the Maryhill club are tentatively finding their feet. That defeat to Accies was the last that Doolan’s men have suffered and while the defence has continued to be miserly – the Jags are tied with league leaders Falkirk for the fewest goals conceded so far this term – there are green shoots of progress with Thistle’s attacking play.
Things are beginning to click into gear – and Doolan believes that defeat to John Rankin’s men in September may well have served as the turning point.
“Possibly,” he replied when the proposition was put to him. “It might be. But you just have to look at the form since then. The run of games that we’ve had and the points we’ve picked up. And across the other teams, has their form been the same as ours? Probably not, apart from Falkirk. So you are mixing it in terms of form with the teams at the top.
“But I do think that Hamilton game, there were lessons for us to learn in terms of creating and finishing. And I think slowly but surely we’ve started to really turn the screw on that. I think you’ve seen that in the performances now, hopefully. And hopefully we start to put away more chances than we miss.
“I think immediately after [the Accies defeat], we learned lessons of how we can be better. I think we’ve continually, gradually got better. We’ve defended well anyway for the full season so far. Going forward, we’ve really started to click into gear.
“Once we put all of that together, both sides together, you see the differences it can make in your form. The upturn in your form. But I think there were lessons to be learned off the back of the Hamilton game, which we didn’t actually play that poorly.
“They scored from a free-kick after we’d just taken Luke McBeth off for a head knock. They whipped a free-kick into an area that he would have been in. We lost but peppered the goal and just couldn’t score. Which was probably indicative of us at the time.
“But now we’re much more creative, much more on the front foot and hopefully that will stand us in good stead.”
One man who will add to Thistle’s creativity is Steven Lawless. The experienced winger, who hasn’t featured since early April through injury, is expected to be included in the squad once again after being left on the bench in Saturday’s 1-1 draw with Raith Rovers.
Doolan believes that Lawless’ presence alone is already making a difference since the 33-year-old returned to first-team training, but he won’t be tempted into rushing his former team-mate back before he is fully prepared for the rough-and-tumble of Scottish football’s second tier.
“He’s a very creative player,” Doolan explained. “Having him back for one minute will be a benefit. Just getting him on the pitch, I think just his presence and the fact that he is who he is. The opposition know that as well. They know how dangerous he can be.
“I think all these things feed into the fact it’s just brilliant to have him back. There are no negatives to having Steven Lawless back in your squad. I think everybody knows that.
“He’s been out for such a long time and we have to be respectful of that. I respect it and Steven respects the fact that he’s been out for so long. So I have to be respectful in the way we do it.
“But also I want him to get it right so that when he does come on, he can impact the games in whatever way, shape or form we ask him to.”
Midfielder Ben Stanway, meanwhile, is not expected to play again this year after picking up an injury in a reserves game midweek.
“Ben will be out for, it looks like, up to eight weeks,” Doolan added. “He injured his calf against Rangers in a reserve game. It looks like he’s got a wee small tear. So he’ll possibly miss up to eight weeks. But apart from that, the squad wouldn’t really change too much from last weekend.”
Doolan added: “Not much has changed. Casper Nilsson will still miss out. He looks like he’ll be missing out for the next couple of weeks.
“Zander MacKenzie is still out. But they’re all making their way, starting to come back to training now. Mitch [David Mitchell] is starting to train again.”
