Spittal the spark as Jags stay on track

BLAIR SPITTAL was the stand-out performer as Partick Thistle maintained their hopes of last 16 involvement, even if qualifying as group winners is beyond them. The summer signing from Dundee United was the architect of the first goal and scored the second as Thistle made heavy weather of taking care of League One Airdrieonians. Now with Livingston winning Group H after beating Stranraer 4-2, the Jags will need to beat the Blues on Saturday to qualify as one of the best runners-up. Thistle were quickly in control, taking the lead in 10 minutes. Spittal hit a great ball forward to Chris Erskine who had timed his run perfectly to get in behind the Airdrie defence then unselfishly rolled a pass to Kris Doolan, who made no mistake with a left-foot shot from six yards. However, with great credit Airdrie responded and Tomas Cerny had to be alert to save long-range efforts from Ryan Conroy and Andy Ryan and also blocked a very good Conroy free-kick on 24 minutes. It sparked Partick into life and on 40 minutes Alan Archibald’s side scored the all-important second goal to knock the wind out of Airdrie. Once again the movement of Erskine was key as he took Spittal’s pass on the left side of the box and hammered a left-foot shot that Ferguson could only push up into the danger area and Spittal pounced to slam a left-foot shot into the unprotected net. Dean Cairns bulleted a header into the left corner on 55 minutes to half the deficit for Airdrie. It gave the Diamonds hope when there should not have been any but Thistle saw the game out easily. Manager Archibald said: ‘After 15 minutes or so, we had scored and hit the bar and I think the players thought it was going to be a bit easy. I was disappointed with the goal we lost but I wasn’t too concerned. Now we need to win on Saturday to get through and that should be motivation enough to see us get there.’ Acting Airdrie boss Gordon Dalziel said: ‘A lot of people thought we would take a doing but I was proud of the boys.’