St Johnstone manager Tommy Wright took aim at his players for their lack of concentration as Abdul Osman grabbed a dramatic late winner for Partick Thistle to give Alan Archibald’s men their second away win of the week, and their third consecutive win by this scoreline at McDiarmid Park.
The goal was a personal nightmare for Saints midfielder Liam Craig, who took a heavy touch in the area, succeeding only in presenting the ball to David Amoo. As he went to meet the winger he was completely fooled by Amoo’s drop of the shoulder, who then teed up Osman to claim the points.
For Wright, the passage of play was symptomatic of the late lapses his side have been suffering in the league of late, as they dropped down to fifth place.
“You get into injury time should see the game out – but we don’t because we make bad mistakes,” said a less than chipper Wright. “We get punished and rightly so. We were the architects of our own downfall.
“Liam shouldn’t be there, I don’t know why he’s there. Joe Shaughnessy can clear the ball, he’s gone into an area he doesn’t have to be in. But when he gets there he should just clear the ball.
“You see the game out and get a point. It happened at Inverness too and it’s not nice. We’re got to learn from it.”
Despite the late drama, it should be easy enough for the producers of Sportscene to package up the highlights from this one, with most of the action taking place in one remarkable first half minute that outshone the rest of the match by the length of the A9.
The visitors took the lead on 17 minutes as Sean Welsh floated a free-kick to the back post where Danny Devine rose highest to knock the ball across goal for Kris Doolan to touch home from a couple of yards.
One of the oldest clichés in the book is that you are at your most vulnerable just after you score, but Thistle’s players had barely stopped celebrating when they shipped an equaliser within 60 seconds.
Wotherspoon turned Adam Barton brilliantly in the area before lifting his head to pick out Steven MacLean, who opened up his body to complete a simple side-foot finish beyond Stuckmann from 10 yards.
After that flurry, it looked for all the world to be heading towards one of those games that puts the stale in stalemate, before Osman got his first goal for two years and snatched the win that Thistle’s second-half display merited.
They had started the game well too, and only a last ditch tackle from Brian Easton denied Ade Azeez the opener within two minutes after the forward showed some neat footwork in the box.
Danny Swanson showed nimble feet himself as the home side threatened for the first time, nutmegging Christie Elliott and dancing past Osman before drawing the first save from Stuckmann.
After the goals though the game descended into something of a midfield scrap with neither side giving an inch. Both teams put together some decent passing, but there was little penetration until well into the second half when Ade Azeez drew a save from Clark with a shot from the edge of the area.
Doolan then produced a lovely headed flick that picked out the run in behind by Ryan Edwards, who was starting to pose a real threat, but the Australian’s effort was again repelled by Clark.
Thistle looked the likelier side to grab the three points, and they duly did so with Osman's dramatic late intervention. The Thistle captain was booked for his wild celebrations, but he cared as much about that as he did about the method by which the ball found the back of the net.
“He said it hit off his shin!” laughed his manager Alan Archibald.
“It has been a good week. After dropping points against Ross County at home it looked tough, but we’ve taken seven points from three fixtures and we go into another tough run of fixtures, but we’ve given ourselves a platform now to go and perform.”
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