Airdrie United Post Match Reaction
Sunday 26th July 2009
While the ALBA Challenge Cup isn't perhaps our number one priority it was still the aim to start the season with a win at Airdrie United and thanks to a 51st minute goal from Liam Buchanan we managed to do just that.
www.ptfc.co.uk was able to speak to manager Ian McCall after the game and before looking at the 90 minutes as a whole he was able to give us a little update on Alan Archibald whose injury left Thistle playing with ten men for the last few minutes.
"It is a worry because it is the same knee that he had surgery on during the close season. It's a bit too early to say for sure but neither the doctor or the physio think that it is too serious. We will obviously have the injury assessed and it could be that he will need a wee tidy up. If he does knowing Alan he would be out for no more than a few weeks. To repeat though it is too early to say for sure. One thing that is clear though is that Alan is an important player for us."
Looking back at the game Ian was a fairly contented man.
"Last year taught us that the Challenge Cup isn't a high profile tournament and even when we got the semi-final the crowd was only about 2,500. I said to the players though that if we were to get to the Final it would be a great occasion and we were obviously delighted to knock the holders out."
"We were under a bit of pressure to get the win at the end of the match but with Airdrie United fielding what was almost a 2-4-4 formation at that stage, which you have to do if you want to come from behind in a cup tie, I felt that the last 25 minutes of the game were a little false. If I have one complaint it was that we weren't quite wise enough to cut them open when they were pushing for an equaliser."
"I was delighted, but not surprised, to see Liam Buchanan open his account for the season on the opening day. I know people were starting to talk about the chances that Liam was missing. Liam will always miss chances but I never had any doubt at all that he will score goals. He's getting fitter all the time and another 90 minutes on a big pitch and in hot conditions will have done him no harm at all. I told him after the game that he had scored 1 goal from 3 chances so that was a 33% success rate. Liam claims it one goal, one game and a 100% success rate!"
"Looking elsewhere I was really pleased with the impact that Chris Erskine made after he came on at half-time. Overall that was a satisfactory start to the competitive season."
