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QUEEN OF THE SOUTH 1 : 0 PARTICK THISTLE 20th November 2004
Scott
Rating: 7.60
Paton
Rating: 6.16
Thomson
Rating: 7.59
1
Craig
Rating: 7.77
English
Rating: 5.98
S1
Burns
Rating: 5.80
McColligan
Rating: 5.94
S2
Bowey
Rating: 4.98
Gibson
Rating: 5.97
Lyle
Rating: 5.87
S3
McLaughlin
Rating: 5.75
SUBSTITUTES
S1 - 52
Payne
Rating: 5.67
S2 - 63
Bagan
Rating: 5.92
S4 - 73
Wood
Rating: 5.91
McNiven
Barnard
SUBMIT YOUR mom RATINGS
Members of the Internet Fan Club can award players marks out of ten for their performance today. The player with the most points awarded in the two days following a match will be the IFC Man of the Match. All of the points will then be added to a running total for each player and the results published in the mom League Table.

Name or IFC No.
MATCH SUMMARY
Following on from the disappointing display and result at Hamilton last Saturday manager Iain Scott made further fundamental changes as he searched for that elusive successful formula. Onto the bench went Gary Wood, still carrying an injury and facing two matches on the sideline due to suspension, also more surprisingly onto the bench went top scorer David McNiven, from a side in the midst of a goal drought. The changes on the pitch were Tommy English restored to left back with David Craig moving into the middle of the defence alongside Jim Thomson. Whilst the place of McNiven was taken by Brian McLaughlin. To complete the changes Stephen Payne was restored to the bench with Chris Armstrong dropping out of the sixteen.

David Craig at the back and the front today
From the off it was Partick who looked the hungrier side with their midfield determined to close Queens down at every opportunity. The game was enjoyable to watch but was devoid of much in the way of clear cut chances, or even half chances to be honest. The best chance of the opening quarter hour fell to Derek Lyle as he was put in at the back post via a Tommy English cross field ball that was just touched away by Aussie defender Adrian Madaschi.

Lyle is beaten to the ball by Madaschi
It was another ten minutes before Queens threatened again as a corner was nodded back across goal by Jim Thomson to Derek Lyle, but the former Jag could only nod over the bar.

If anything it was Partick who were dominating but again the Queens defence proved their worth as very little was able to get by them and when they did, as Leigh Hinds did ten minutes before the break the finishing didn't trouble Scott, Hinds blasting well over as he had a clear sight of goal.

The second half started disastrously for Queens and particularly for young winger Paul Burns as he was caught by Grant Murray in a crunching tackle on the edge of the visitors box. Fortunately it later turned out that the injury wasn't as bad as was feared but that Burnsey had deep stud impressions into his ankle. A straight swap was made by Scott as he gave Stephen Payne a chance to show what he could do down the right hand side of the park.

Burnsey is stretchered off
Queens were rocked for a while and Partick tried to take advantage, a couple of blocking tackles, one from Jim Thomson and one from Brian McColligan prevented the visitors from taking a lead. Scott then swapped Bowey for Bagan in a bid to break the midfield stalemate and Partick introduced the experienced Andy McLaren. McLaren made an immediate difference to the front play of the visitors forward line as he showed a willingness to be much more direct. His first contribution being to set up Juan Escalas for a shot that was deflected wide and his second to have an effort himself that was superbly pushed away by Colin Scott for a corner.

Queens made their final substitution of the afternoon by introducing Gary Wood for Brian McLaughlin and giving the versatile red-head a role up front after playing at right back and centre back in the past few weeks. Queens certainly looked livelier.

With only twelve minutes left to play it looked like Partick were going to get the win as first Colin Scott had to pull off a superb block to deny Panther and then from the rebound Jim Thomson made the saving block of the day as he took the ball off the goal line and pushed it away to safety. Within minutes though Queens had won it as Derek Lyle for once chased a lost cause and managed to win a corner from the left, the ball ended up back out again for a corner from the right which Willie Gibson swung over and onto the head of David Craig, the former Jag headed the ball sweetly into the top far corner giving Arthur or his two defenders on the line no chance to stop it.

Craig powers his header goalward
Strangely Queens then went on to play their most confident and flowing football of the match and could have finished the game off when Derek Lyle had an effort set up by Gary Wood that was just wide. Add to that some last few minutes fisticuffs and petulance and we had most, but not all, of the ingredients for a decent match.

In summary Thistle will feel aggrieved not to have taken something from the match but as a lot of Queens fans said last week , if you don't score goals you don't win games.


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