Queen's Park 1, Partick Thistle 3
Saturday 10th July 2010
Thistle started their pre-season matches with a 3-1 win against Queen’s Park on a wet afternoon in St Andrews.
Although the overhead conditions were far from perfect the made for a slick pitch. Thistle could have hardly have wished to have made a better start with a goal after just 32 seconds of play. The Queen’s keeper was unable to hold on to a Paul Cairney shot and Liam Buchanan was on hand to tuck the ball home from 6 yards out.
As you would imagine with the first pre-season fixture both sides were a little ring rusted and Queen’s were close to tying the scores in the 10th minute. A fine Bryn Halliwell, playing as trialist for now at least, save keeping out a header from point blank range.
It was Thistle though that had the better of the first half exchanges with the trialist number 7 prominent in much of Thistle’s better play. In the 13th minute his excellent right wing cross was cleared for a corner and 8 minutes later his free kick from 22 yards out smacked off the Queen’s crossbar.
After scoring early in the first half Thistle repeated that feat in the second half though not quite as quickly this time. Four minutes of the second half had elapsed when Liam Buchanan’s slightly deflected effort found the back of the net.
Thistle most impressive spell came in the opening period of the second half and they had a strong appeal for a penalty in the 53rd minute when Liam Buchanan looked to be tugged to the ground after being set up by half-time sub Kris Doolan.
Ryan MacBeth came close with a curling effort in the 54th minute before Thistle finally had a third goal after 55 minutes. Of the three Thistle goals this was the pick of the bunch. Paddy Boyle’s cross picked out Liam Buchanan who crossed for Kris Doolan to slide the ball home.
Thistle continued to press but it was Queen’s Park that had the next goal. Paul Paton was caught in possession leaving a Queen’s player clear on goal and he tucked the ball wide of Halliwell and into the net.
Paul Cairney and Kris Doolan both missed chances in the closing stages as Thistle looked for a fourth goal but the Jags were still good value for their win.
Team: Halliwell, Paton, Boyle, Cairney, Robertson (McGeough 45), Maxwell (Stevenson 66), Trialist, Rowson, Buchanan (Burns 55), Hodge (MacBeth 45), Grehan (Doolan 45)
