First Team
Match Preview: Saints v Partick Thistle
18th August 2017
Friday 18th August
Saints aim to maintain their perfect start to their Premiership season as Partick Thistle will make the trip to McDiarmid Park on Saturday.
Wins over Kilmarnock and Motherwell respectively see St Johnstone sit at the top of the league table after the opening two games.
On Saturday, Saints will be looking to the likes of Michael O'Halloran to continue his fine early season form, which has seen the Rangers loanee score three times already.
The visitors will be looking for a repeat of their 3-0 Betfred Cup win over Saints earlier in the month as they attempt to bounce back from a narrow defeat at the hands of Celtic last Friday night. Thistle are yet to pick up a Premiership point thus far after also suffering a 3-1 defeat at Hibernian on the opening day.
Murray Davidson has stressed how Saints are determined to avoid a re-run of the recent cup fixture:
“I felt there was nothing in the Partick game in the cup – we just gave away silly goals at silly times.
“There wasn’t much in the match. They probably edged the first 20 minutes and then after that I thought we were the better team until they got the penalty.
“So although it looks on paper that we got a doing from them, it wasn’t really like that.”
The 2016/17 season saw St Johnstone and Partick clash on five occasions with Saints emerging victorious in three of the four league meetings and Thistle winning the pair's tie in the Scottish Cup.
Match Preview by Gary Peterson