It’s that time of the season when teams are getting a little bit jittery. A defeat here and a couple of points spilled there means you can end up performing the kind of anxious peer over the shoulder you’d do when a tin can mysteriously rattles as you’re gingerly shuffling down a dark alley.
No so long ago, the Partick Thistle players weren’t too concerned about what was going on behind them. They were looking ahead of them to a possible place in the top six of the Scottish Premiership. Having failed to make that half dozen, though, the outlook has changed and Lee Clark, the Kilmarnock manager, knows it doesn’t make for comfortable viewing.
While Clark’s resurgent team were bolstering their bid to haul themselves out of the relegation play-off place they have been stuck in for ages with a rousing 4-0 win at second-bottom Hamilton, Thistle were slithering to a third successive defeat with a morale-sapping 4-1 reversal at home to Inverness Caledonian Thistle.
The Glasgow club travel to Rugby Park this weekend and if they lose to Kilmarnock, they will only be three points ahead of the Ayrshiremen with two games to play. It promises to be a nail-nibbling end to the campaign.
“Maybe Partick are starting to get a bit of fear factor for the first time this season,” admitted Clark. “They were probably looking at the top six before the split happened. Then it happened and they maybe thought about consolidating and finishing as high as they could in that part of the league.
“But, obviously with the results and the way the fixtures have fallen, if we beat them on Saturday, they are right in amongst it. It depends on how their players react to that situation. My players have been around it most of the season. Our job, since I got here, was to stay in the league. It could have an effect.
“One thing Partick have been renowned for this season has been a good defensive record, so for them to concede four last weekend was quite a unique situation.
‘I’d imagine they’ll be hurting at that and not wanting to concede goals as they did against Inverness.”
Since taking over the managerial reins in February, Clark, slowly but surely, has changed Kilmarnock’s fortunes. A narrow 2-1 defeat to Aberdeen and a last gasp loss to Celtic in successive weeks in March demonstrated the club’s spirit against the top two in the league while a 3-0 win over St Johnstone and last weekend’s four goal bonanza against Hamilton showed just what they can do when firing on all cylinders.
Sandwiched between those two victories was a 3-1 defeat up at Inverness but Clark has been impressed by the fortitude of his players in adversity and, as invent-a-phrase pundits would say, their ‘bouncebackability’.
“I’ve been very impressed by the response of the players since I walked in the door, their attitude and application has been terrific," he said.
“An example is Conrad Balatoni at Hamilton after recovering from a bad day at the office in Inverness. It was a bad day for us all, but, especially, for him with the couple of errors.
“But he bounced back in training and that is why I wanted to give him the opportunity, plus I want to show the players that they must play without fear.
“If you do make errors, and everyone has made them, you have to show the players they will not be lambasted and they are not going to be hung out to dry after one game. If it’s repetitive, you need to look at it, but over one game, you have to give players the opportunity to redeem themselves and Conrad did that with flying colours.”
With three huge games to go, Clark is hoping his boys can pass them with flying colours too.
“I can tell in a dressing room if players have stomach for the fight,” he added. “When we are giving them our thoughts and plans, if they don’t have the belief and can’t buy into it, that’s a real negative. But our players have tried to do it from the start.
“When I look back at the tough run against Hearts, Aberdeen and Celtic and we were unfortunate in the three games, they were still sticking to the gameplan and producing good performances and good spells.
“I always had belief we’d get a bit of luck and things would change in our favour. That seems to have been the case.
“From day one, the players have had a belief that the information we are giving them is being taken on board. That shows me they are up for the fight and believing in what we are doing.”
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