Manager post Kelty Hearts
Saturday, 29th Oct 202229/10/22: Link to audio of James McPake’s post match comments
- - Listen to this James McPake interview
Manager James McPake was pleased with the win over Kelty Hearts and the resilience shown by his players:-
“The first 45 you could see the hangover from last week. Certainly in the first 45 we were nowhere near the standards that we ask for. That can be down to a number of factors but automatically you put it down to the first defeat in a while last week.
“We got them in at half time and settled them down. They had scored a worldy, there wasn’t much more else in the first half in terms of goalmouth action really. From the start of the second half we were much more like we have been this season.”
You changed it at half time, the shape as well?
“Yeah, we changed the shape by bringing Chris Hamilton on and he affected the game really well. I thought that we were losing a lot of second balls.
“Kelty are a good side, they are used to winning games and that goes back to last year when Kevin Thomson was there. Potts has come on and when I saw them last time I saw enough to know that they would hurt teams. They beat Falkirk up there (in their next home game) and then they have gone to Falkirk last week and taken points off Falkirk but I’m not just talking about Falkirk, they will take points off everybody because they are a good side with some experienced pros through the team.
“And they carry that opposite thing from us which is a massive thing in football and hangs around, which is winning games. We have been the club that has been used to losing games, they are the club that has been used to winning games. They have good players, they play to their strengths and give us a tough game up there. We knew it was going to be a tough game today, you just need to look at their form.
“I think that they are the form team in the league and they have come here and credit to them because they came to try and win the game. Not a lot of teams do that when they come here.”
It was a smashing goal to win it?
“You could talk about their goal, it was a great strike but the (second) goal from us is what I will talk most about is the decision by Chris Mochrie to take the extra touch when everybody is telling him to play it wide. That is intelligence but also from Aaron Comrie because if he knows if he just makes that extra run, Chris has got the ability, got the bravery which is a good word to describe it because the full crowd are shouting shoot or pass.
“He makes his own mind up, he is calm in that position and he plays the ball out to Aaron who makes a great run. It is something that we work on, Aaron fires it across and Craig puts it in the net.
“You know it was fitting that Craig Wighton scored the winner today. For me he was the best player on the pitch and that is Craig Wighton getting back to the Craig Wighton that I know.”
You can see the difference now the injury has cleared up?
“That is natural, he is only young as wel. Everybody looks at Wighty like he is some seasoned pro. I have known Wighty for ten years now and he is still only 25, it is mad. If he scored the one when he was through everybody would have been talking about that. It’s a wee bit strange that we are not.
“I don’t believe that I’m going to say this, I’m glad that he did not score that because I wanted to see if we had the character to hang on after what had happened against Peterhead and then losing our first game. Deniz had a couple of saves at the end but we expect that and we need to defend because they were trying to salvage something from the game like we were last week.
“Up at Montrose you throw everything at it and you get hurt with a sucker punch. They were doing that today but we stood strong and resilient. It took us 45 minutes to get Montrose out of our system but that is it well and truly gone.”
Did it feel like a proper derby?
“It didn’t feel any different to last week or next week. There were three points up for grabs. It did feel different, it felt good because we got three points. I have played in derbies, I have managed in derbies, there is outside noise but when you step on that pitch or the touchline unfortunately now for me - I much prefer the pitch - you get the football head on and everything is about causing the other team problems and stopping the problems that they are causing you. I think that we managed to do that today thankfully.”
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