Four reasons this could finally be the year for Partick Thistle

The feel-good factor around Firhill just won’t budge. We may only be a few weeks into the new season, but the sense of optimism permeating around Maryhill is palpable, with Partick Thistle supporters daring to dream that this could finally be their year. And with good reason, too.

There is still an awful lot of football to be played, and a ball has barely been kicked in anger in this early stage of the campaign, but things are certainly looking rosy for the auld Jags. With seven points claimed out of nine in the league and a solitary goal conceded, Mark Wilson’s men have hit the ground running in their bid to end Thistle’s decade-long exile from the top flight.

So, why are fans feeling uncharacteristically bullish about their promotion chances this season? How have Wilson’s men established themselves among the frontrunners for the title? Let’s take a look.

This is perhaps the single biggest contributing factor to the Jags’ strong start to the new season. It’s no secret that teams that get close to achieving promotion without getting over the line are often ripped up in the summer, with managers left trying to rebuild their team from scratch, and Thistle fans could be forgiven for thinking that history was going to repeat itself during the close season.

At the risk of reopening some painful old wounds, just look back at the denouement to the 2022/23 campaign. The Jags, of course, suffered an astonishing collapse in Dingwall to deny them promotion at the final hurdle, and the team was subsequently picked apart. Key players like Scott Tiffoney, Kyle Turner, Kevin Holt and Ross Docherty were poached by top-flight sides. Loanees like Kerr McInroy, Lewis Neilson and Tomi Adeloye returned to their parent clubs, and then-manager Kris Doolan found himself having to replace half of his starting line-up.

That didn’t happen this time, though. Credit is due to sporting director Ian Baraclough for getting deals over the line, while the close-knit atmosphere among the playing squad fostered by Wilson and Alex Rae surely played its part too. But the long and short of it is that at a time when the squad was vulnerable, just about everyone opted to stick around.

Permanent deals were struck for Celtic loanees Josh Clarke and Ben McPherson back in February – and were rightly lauded as a coup at the time – and even though the former ended up upping sticks to join Doncaster Rovers, the Jags moved quickly to replace the keeper with Scotland Under-21 internationalist Liam McFarlane. Sources at the Scottish FA and Tynecastle remain convinced the Hearts youngster has all the makings of a future Scotland No.1.

Other loan players decided to follow suit and sign permanent deals. Oisin Smyth’s move was practically a formality after the Northern Irishman returned to Firhill in January after his initial loan spell was interrupted, while versatile defender Ethan Ingram followed suit. Even Gary Mackay-Steven, who was brought in on a short-term deal at the tail end of last season, decided to stick around for another year.

Perhaps most important of all, though, were the out-of-contract players who decided to put pen to paper on fresh terms. There were three in particular whose futures will have caused a few sleepless nights for Wilson: Ben Stanway, Aidan Fitzpatrick and Logan Chalmers.

Most supporters would have snapped your hand off if they were given the opportunity to retain one member of the trio, yet Thistle ultimately convinced both Stanway and Fitzpatrick to re-sign. The former rightly swept the boards at the club’s annual awards ceremony and it is frankly astonishing that no Premiership team was tempted to take a punt on him, while the latter enjoyed arguably his best-ever season at Firhill, chipping in with an incredible 17 assists and six goals.

Yes, Chalmers departed, but in truth, the winger’s form had been flagging during the second half of last season. His departure was a blow, but an expected one. And the new arrivals look more than up to the challenge of replacing his output.

The Jags’ alacrity in the market cannot be underestimated, either. Historically, Thistle tend to be a little slow out of the traps each summer, but that appears to have changed under Baraclough. The sporting director’s serious accident while on his honeymoon last summer , coupled with the uncertainty surrounding the manager role, had an obvious knock-on effect on the team’s transfer business a year ago, and this time the club made sure they were on the front foot from the get-go.

Deals for Ben Dempsey, Seb Drozd and Euan Henderson were wrapped up and announced within weeks of the Premiership play-off final defeat to St Mirren, and the Jags’ alacrity in the market allowed them to bed in quickly and get used to Wilson’s tactical ideas. Dempsey only has a couple of substitute appearances to his name so far after recovering from an injury, and it is probably too soon to give a proper appraisal of the former Ayr United captain’s impact at Firhill. But Henderson, and Drozd in particular, have already made their mark.

The two players looked bright during the group stages of the Premier Sports Cup. Drozd is a like-for-like replacement for Chalmers, tasked with taking on his man at every opportunity and cutting inside onto his favoured left foot to create chances in the vein of an inside forward. Henderson, meanwhile, is more versatile, capable of playing anywhere across the front three. He has looked especially effective playing on the left and drifting inside before testing the opposition keeper with a shot from distance, and he helped swing the game in Thistle’s favour away to Greenock Morton on the opening day with an eye-catching cameo off the bench.

Both look like they know exactly what is expected of them within Wilson’s system, and their early starts to life at Firhill have surely played a part here. Henderson offers something a bit different from what the Jags had last season, while Drozd has been superb and has made the right wing spot his own. His performance against Livingston in particular, where he bamboozled and twisted the Livi defence this way and that, showed exactly what the former Queen’s Park man was all about.

Another factor that should not be overlooked is that all four summer arrivals – Dempsey, Drozd, Henderson and McFarlane – were long-term transfer targets. The Jags had been pursuing the quartet for a full year before they eventually pitched up at Firhill, and Wilson knew exactly what he was getting and how best to use them. Would that have happened had the Jags been scrambling around for players at the last minute to plug gaps in the squad? Almost certainly not.

That long-term approach to recruitment, combined with players who looked like they were leaving signing fresh terms, put Thistle in a strong position before the squad had even reported back for pre-season training. They managed to retain the vast majority of last season’s team while adding a little extra, and they are reaping the rewards of that continuity just now.