ALAN Archibald has revealed that his preparations for tomorrow’s match at Kilmarnock have been hampered by injuries, with just nine players training for most of the week.

The Partick Thistle manager has been without a host of first-team regulars, with youths being drafted in to make up the numbers.

He is hoping that the likes of Abdul Osman and Stevie Lawless, who were forced off after picking up knocks against Inverness last week, will recover in time to face the Rugby Park side.

“We’ve only had nine on the training pitch, so it’s been tough,” he said.

“We picked up two injuries last week in the game and there are other guys carrying injuries too.

“The break can’t come quickly enough for us. We had 12 today including kids. That’s the first time we’ve had double figures this week. All we could do was shooting. There’s not much you can do in terms of working on shape. We’re lopsided in terms of personnel between defenders and attackers, so we’ll need to try to squeeze in as much as we can tomorrow and we’re still waiting to see if players are going to be fit.

“Stevie Lawless and Abdul Osman haven’t trained with us yet, but we’ll give them until the last minute. We’ll wait and see but, whatever we’ve got, we’ll hopefully have enough there to go and win us the match.

“Regardless of who we get out on the pitch, we showed on Saturday that the guys coming off the bench like David Amoo and Ade Azeez gave us a bit of quality. We’ll need everybody, but we’re in confident mood.”

Despite his potential injury worries, Archibald was not for playing down the significance of tomorrow’s game.

He doesn’t think the match will be decisive in terms of making the top six, but the Fir Hill manager has made it clear to his players that the outcome will go a long way towards reaching that target.

He said: “It’s huge. It’s a massive game. It’s strange because the last time we played them we were at the bottom end of the league and they weren’t far above us. Obviously, things have moved on. They’ve changed their manager and we’ve won a few games, and now we’ve got a chance to open up a gap.

“That’s what it is essentially, another massive six-pointer, and I seem to be saying that to the players every week. It’s another big game and they are just getting bigger.

“I think it will be a totally different type of game from the last time because both teams will be going to win the game. As I said, it’s huge.”

Archibald hopes that the spectacle for the supporters doesn’t suffer as a result of the pressure on the players, and insists their current plight doesn’t compare to a relegation battle.

“It’s more enjoyable than when we went down there after the split last year when it was a relegation battle,” he said.

“If we had lost that, I think we were back to two points and essentially we won the game that put them in the play-offs. That’s worse nerves. That’s panic time.”