Tomas Cerny admits this is the most difficult spell he has had as a Partick Thistle player, and he says that the Firhill squad owe it to manager Alan Archibald to put on a performance against Dundee this afternoon.

The keeper has been aghast at the fall-off in performance levels in the last two matches from the Jags as they fell tamely to defeats at the hands of Motherwell and Kilmarnock.

And he says that Thistle can ill-afford another performance of that ilk, because if they don’t improve soon, it will be the player’s necks who will be on the chopping board.

“We have been in difficult positions before, but this does feel on the back of the last couple of performances that it is the most difficult time I’ve had here,” Cerny said.

“Before we were in bad positions in terms of points, but we felt our performances were good. We’ve let ourselves down in the last couple of games.

“We definitely owe [the manager] a performance. The gaffer is doing the same good job as always and can only do so much in terms or preparation.

“He can’t step on the pitch for us and help us there, so it’s up to us to give him a really good performance.

“The dressing room is behind him, of course, and I don’t think there is anyone talking about a change of manager or anything.

“Other clubs have changed their managers already and you don’t really want to get to that point.

“You want to get results, and everyone is playing for their own jobs as well, it’s not just the manager’s job, it’s all of ours as well.

“Your performances determine what happens with your career, so everyone knows what we are playing for.”

It wasn’t so long ago that the Thistle players and their manager were being lauded for last season’s impressive top-six finish, but Cerny acknowledges that they can’t live off that achievement any more.

“Nobody cares about that,” he said. “Nobody cares about last week - ok maybe last week - but the week before that.

“All anyone will be talking about is Saturday’s game and then when that’s finished, people won’t be talking about that, they’ll be talking about Hamilton.

“That’s what it is, and things change very quickly in football. People forget the good things very quickly. “Let’s hope we win on Saturday and things turn around. One result can make a big difference.”

The one thing that Thistle cannot afford to do this afternoon according to Cerny, is throw in the towel if things start to go against them at any stage.

He has stressed the need for all of the Jags players to maintain their belief that they can turn things around, not only in individual games, but looking at the bigger picture too.

“On Saturday it was strange,” he said. “Everybody wants to do their best, but it didn’t look like it.

“We tried our best and it is kind of difficult to accept that, but we need to learn from it.

“In the first season we were up we had 10 games and no wins and managed to turn it around, last season it was Christmas-time and we were bottom of the league, and we managed to turn it around.

“So, we have to believe that there is definitely enough in this squad to turn it around again. But we have to show it on the pitch.”