Partick Thistle’s Ryan Edwards admits he was taken aback at the reaction to his tackle on Rangers midfielder Ryan Jack in the Friday night clash between the sides, saying he can’t see what all the fuss was about.

The Aussie midfielder was surprised by the level of coverage surrounding the challenge in the days that followed, insisting there was no malice intended on his part.

He believes it was a 50/50 between two honest players, and had the incident taken place against any other side outside of the Old Firm, like in today’s game against Motherwell, he wouldn’t have heard anything else about it.

“If there is a tackle to be won, no-one in the team will shy away from it,” said Edwards.

“No-one is trying to hurt an opponent, nothing like that, it’s just a matter of the ball’s there to be won and you don’t pull out of it.

“Ryan Jack does that – as do Motherwell players. Every little moment matters in games and it’s about trying to come out best rather than second best.

“I think there was too much made of the challenge on Ryan. I was really surprised by the media coverage.

“I wasn’t actually tackling, I was just trying to put my foot on the ball but the way Ryan Jack came in it looked like it was a 50-50 and I have gone over the ball and clipped him.

“I apologised afterwards but it wasn’t malicious as I would never look to hurt an opponent. We spoke and he appreciated it. He knows the ball is there to be won.

“It was the same with the Jack Hendry incident in the Dundee-Celtic game. There was a lot of media attention on that but I didn’t think anything of it. He was looking at the ball and after the tackle he looked away.

“I think against the bigger teams you want to impose yourself and show your aggression so they know they are in for a game and they won’t have all the possession.

“Maybe these things are blown up because you’re playing one of the Old Firm and it’s on TV.”

It promises to be a tasty affair again today as the Jags travel to Fir Park to take on a Motherwell side who have been toughened up this season under new manager Stephen Robinson.

“It might be a battle,” said Edwards. “Motherwell have strengthened really well. We saw the cup game against Aberdeen when they won 3-0. They really bullied them – not in an aggressive manner – and took the game to them really high in energy.

“We’ve been doing that too but we can do better, so it looks like it will be a game that will be quite tough and maybe not too much pretty football.”

Edwards, like his Thistle teammates, is desperate to start getting wins on the board as they go into their eighth league match today still looking for a victory.

Their tough run of fixtures looks to be easing slightly from today onwards, but he is wary that Thistle’s effort levels remain the same regardless of the opposition.

“Confidence is still high,” he said. “The performances have been there and now after playing these difficult games we’ve had in the first two months of the season, we’re looking to pick up points against teams we feel we can challenge for that top-six position.

“Hopefully that starts against Motherwell. The difficult thing is we have put so much into the first seven games and not got as many points as we would have liked.

“It’s a matter of continuing our energy levels and mentality. We’ve been conceding late goals so we need to stay really focused.

“In five out of the seven games we have scored first and either conceded an equaliser or lost the game. It happened last season when we were also conceding late goals. We drop deeper and deeper, but it's a mentality thing and we have to keep to our gameplan for the whole game."