Partick vs Queen of South preview - McGowan unable to make impression

Posted Saturday, April 02, 2011 by PA

Partick will look to pull themselves closer to visitors Queen of the South with a victory at Firhill.

But the Jags will have to cope without Ryan McGowan, who has completed his loan and returned to Hearts.

Paul Paton, Paul Cairney, Bryan Hodge and Ryan MacBeth.will all miss out through injury.

The Glasgow side are determined not to let their season end on a whimper, with assistant manager Ian Maxwell saying: "We are not going to go up and it is unlikely that we are going to go down, but we want to finish the season as high up the table as possible.

"A win would pull us to within two points of Queen of the South, with a game in hand, but we are targeting third place between now and the end of our games."

Queen of the South boss Kenny Brannigan is hoping to restore goalkeeper David Hutton and defender Bob Harris to his starting line up against Partick Thistle as both players continue their recovery from injury.

Youngster Daniel Orsi is out injured and he will be joined on the sidelines by the more experienced pair of Rocco Quinn and Allan Johnston, with big striker Derek Holmes in line for a place on the bench.

Brannigan said: "Thistle will have an eye on catching us in the table and we will need to be wary of that.

"We have won four times in the past five games so despite our injury problems the players have continued to deliver at a high level and will need to do so to win against Thistle."