SECONDS out, round two. Partick Thistle may have won the initial battle for Premiership survival, knocking Ross County out of the reckoning with the vital win over Dundee on Saturday, but the real war might well still be to come.

On the face of it, Blair Spittal doesn’t have the look of your archetypal pugilist. The Thistle attacker has always relied on brain over brawn and craft over crunching tackles, but he knows that when his side square up to Livingston in the play-off final over two legs, the pitch will be no place for those who are faint of heart.

That prospect doesn’t faze him though, and he came out fighting after the win at Dens Park to insist that the Firhill side will not be bullied by David Hopkin’s men in the same way that Dundee United were.

“We need to be ready,” said Spittal. “We know that we will need to win the battle first and foremost and earn the right to play. It’s the old cliché. We will make sure we are ready for that come Thursday.

“I watched their semi-final on TV and thought Livi were good. I thought they deserved the win over the two games. They get after the game. It is all about the battling qualities that they have got. You have to make sure you win the second balls and you are up on it. You cannot let them stamp their authority on the game.

“We need to put our game plan onto them and make sure that we come out on top in that respect.

“We need to stay patient. We know what Livi are like and we played against them in the Betfred Cup earlier in the season.

“It is important now that we don’t get too high after this result, recover and dust ourselves down for Thursday.”

Nobody needs to tell Spittal how bitter the taste of defeat at this stage can be. He was part of the Dundee United side who lost out to Hamilton last season, with the Arabs looking punched out by the time they arrived in Lanarkshire for the second leg after a gruelling run to the final.

But with Livingston finishing second and with Thistle going through their own emotional rollercoaster over the last few weeks, he doesn’t think that there is any advantage to be claimed prior to the tie.

“We had a totally different route with Dundee United last year,” he said. “We had the six games and it was difficult come the end when we played Hamilton.

“We know we are probably going to be the favourites going into it, but we are going to have to make sure we handle that and be confident going in.

“I don’t think there is any advantage for anyone in terms of fixtures in this one. We have probably played the same amount of games. It was just important we got the win at Dundee to build a wee bit of momentum going into the game on Thursday.”

They got that win at Dens Park as Kris Doolan – who else? – climbed off the bench around the hour mark to settle a match in which the home side had one foot on the beach and the away side were inhibited by the enormity of what they were playing for.

Dundee’s slackness contributed to the goal, Simon Murray losing the ball in midfield to allow Stevie Lawless to advance on goal. Even then, his through ball to Doolan should have been cut out by Genseric Kusunga, but the ball found its way to the feet of the one man Thistle wanted it to. Doolan was ice-cool as he slipped the ball under young goalkeeper Calum Ferrie, and despite a nerve-jangling finale, Thistle lived to fight another day.

For Dundee, the only real positives they seemed to take from the day were the performances of Ferrie and Dan Jefferies on their first starts for the club, and the fact that near-neighbours United wouldn’t be joining them in the Premiership.

Manager Neil McCann savaged the rest of his players after the game, and Ferrie wasn’t surprised by his reaction despite their recent good form.

“It’s just football, isn’t it?” he said. “You win games, you lose games. The manager is going to be upset. It is the same thing everywhere you go and everywhere you play from the Sunday League to the Champions League.

“Rightly so, because this wasn’t a great performance from us overall. We move on and focus on next season now.

“The manager didn’t say anything personal to me. Just ‘well done’. That was all that was said because, at the end of the day, I just did my job.

“I did concede a goal and I am very annoyed about that. I wanted to keep a clean sheet because that is what goalkeepers live off. I hate conceding goals and I will probably have a nightmare featuring that one now.

“I will hopefully come back in pre-season, push as hard as I can and will have competition in El and Kyle. I will push and see where that takes me.”