THE celebrations contained as much joy as they did relief for Partick Thistle. It had been some time since they had experienced that winning feeling and the smiles remained on the faces of those at Firhill long after they returned to Glasgow on Wednesday evening.

Alan Archibald’s side got their Premiership campaign off to a perfect start with victory over Inverness on the opening day of the season but little has gone right for them in the weeks since. The Jags were knocked out of the Betfred Cup just days later and would then embark on a run that left them without a win in eight Premiership matches.

That sequence came to a welcome end at Dens Park, though. The points that moved Thistle four points clear of Dundee were more than welcome and they have had a lasting impact on the Firhill squad.

“It is a totally different mood, it is a great mood,” boss Archibald said. “It has been a long time coming and we have had a few sore ones in the previous weeks. It is a much better feeling and you can sense the relief in the lads as well getting the monkey off our backs. It was dragging on and we are delighted to get it over and done with.

“I am not going to dress it up, it is hard after it on the Sunday and the Monday. It is difficult to take, especially if you have played well. The other side of that is you can take positives from it if you have played well. We thought on Saturday against County it was a positive performance and we got that on Wednesday night.

“The difference was that we got goals at the right time and we put them to bed with the second one. The games have been positive, we have been creating chances. We only had one really awful performance that we were disappointed with. You always think it is going to clink and thankfully it did for us the other day.”

Having finally rediscovered that winning formula, Thistle must now find a way of putting a sustained run together in the Premiership to continue their climb away from the foot of the standings.

Victory over Dundee moved them four points clear of Paul Hartley’s side but they now face a St Johnstone outfit that are flying high in third spot.

It is the start of a series of fixtures that will see the Jags face Aberdeen, Rangers, Hearts and Celtic twice in the final few weeks of 2015 and Archibald is keen to have more reasons to be cheerful at Firhill.

“We know the fixtures we have got coming up,” he said. “We dropped a lot of points at home there against teams that are round about us in the league at the moment. So it is vital that we go to Perth and get something going into the run of games that we have got. We have got Aberdeen, Celtic and Rangers so there are tough games ahead for us.

“We had a good record last year against St Johnstone, we won all three games. But they came and turned us over comfortably here earlier on and that was one that we had no complaints about because they were by far the better team on the day.

“Compared to the other night at Dens when we had eleven good performances, we probably had one or two maybe in that game. We need a much better performance on the day to go and beat them.”

As attentions turn to the trip to McDiarmid Park this afternoon, one player who has an extra wide grin is defender Liam Lindsay. Just hours after helping Thistle earn only their second clean sheet of the Premiership campaign, the defender put pen-to-paper on a deal that will keep him in red and yellow until the summer of 2019.

Lindsay has become an integral part of Archibald’s plans and the 21-year-old feels he will only improve under the tutelage of the former Firhill captain.

“It’s good to get it signed and sealed,” Lindsay said. “I knew it’s been coming over the last couple of weeks bit I’m delighted to get it signed and hopefully I’ll do well for the club. The manager has been good with me. After every match we’ll look through the game and he’ll talk to you individually to point out your mistake and how to rectify it.

“He makes it clear it’s alright to make mistakes as long as you learn from it. I hope I keep learning and improving with experience.

“The manager is quite cool-headed. He’s not the type to go screaming and shouting - well maybe a wee bit after the game - but come Monday once everything has cooled down he’s easy to talk to. He’s a good guy to learn from, especially with all he’s done in the game as a defender he’s perfect for me.”