They may be 10 points off the bottom but Alan Archibald, the Partick Thistle manager, continues to peer over his shoulder. That’s what the top-six, bottom-six split can do to you.
It’s a bit like that jittery, startled feeling you get when you walk down a dimly lit lane and suddenly hear a cat screeching and a dust bin lid clattering to the ground behind you.
While the promised land of the top half dozen is in Thistle’s grasp, the menace of missing out and being dragged back into a perilous scrap in the lower reaches remains.
Archibald’s troops occupy that sixth-place, two points ahead of seventh placed Dundee, and with Inverness Caledonian Thistle coming to Maryhill tomorrow, Thistle have a chance to both fortify their stronghold in the top half and move 13 points clear of their weekend guests who prop up the table.
“It’s a massive six-pointer,” said Archibald with a line plucked from the first page of the Concise Guide to Footballing Cliches and Old Chestnuts.
“The first priority is to get away from the relegation danger area for good and then drive on for top six. It’s in our own hands just now but I know a few other managers will be saying exactly the same thing. I was at the Kilmarnock and Motherwell game last Saturday with other managers and we’re all thinking ‘I need to get points from you’. It’s dog eat dog and we all have a run of fixtures where we’re all playing each other so it’s a chance to go and put points on the board.”
In this pressurised business that can be more cut throat than an afternoon in Sweeney Todd’s salon, Archibald knows how quickly fortunes can change. His Celtic counterpart, Brendan Rodgers, suggested the other day that there should be a managerial transfer window in an effort to curb the rabid hiring and firing and Archibald would certainly be an ‘aye’ in a vote at a meeting of the union of managers.
“I would go along with that and it makes a lot of sense but I don’t think owners will let it happen,” he said. “It would give managers a little bit of stability which would be a good thing and you wouldn’t be panicking about your next result. It’s very strange that a quarter of the Premiership is without a manager but you can understand why people make these decisions because there is so much at stake.”
Last weekend’s fairly meek surrender to Aberdeen in the William Hill Scottish Cup was a bit of a scunner for Archibald, given the profitable, purposeful run his side had been on. “We didn’t do ourselves justice but we’ve had a week’s recovery,” added Archibald, who is confident that both Danny Devine and Christie Elliott will recover from some aches and pains. “We need to get over the disappointment of the cup game and focus on the league again.”
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