SOMETIMES, a draw can feel like a defeat, but it is unusual for both sides to come away from a match feeling that way. Unfortunately for Partick Thistle and Ross County given their respective precarious positions in the table, a point apiece from their clash last night at Firhill doesn’t really do either club any favours.

They may not have appreciated in the immediate aftermath of the result, but it is the home fans who should perhaps find more solace in their position, particularly with how their situation has improved since the last meeting between these teams.

Just four weeks ago, their players and supporters licked their wounds as they snaked mournfully down the snow-laden A9 with the spectre of automatic relegation hanging heavy over them. They had just been thumped by four goals to nil in an abject surrender that condemned them to the foot of the table, and they looked like a team that was resigned to their fate. As it stands, at least it is in their own hands to avoid that automatic relegation spot, where County now sit two points adrift with two games remaining.

“I’ve no idea where that leaves us, but we’ll keep on fighting, that’s for sure,” said Thistle boss Alan Archibald. “It looks like it might go to the final day.

“I thought we started really well and were on the front foot and deservedly went ahead, but I thought we hit the panic button for 10 minutes and our decision-making went a little bit.

“You can see that we haven’t led in many games, and County tweaked things and got themselves back in the game.”

The first knockings of the game were as nervy as you might expect given what was at stake, and while the large home crowd were vocal in support of their team, there was no mistaking the nervous anticipation that hung heavy over Firhill.

That tension was briefly released as an error from the County defence allowed Thistle to hit the front, Harry Souttar misjudging a high ball that went through to Kris Doolan, with the Thistle skipper peeling wide and firing a ball into the middle where Chris Erskine came thundering in to volley low past Scott Fox.

County’s response came in the shape of an enterprising run from Jason Naismith that saw him eventually get on the end of a low cross from Michael Gardyne, but Baily Cargill threw himself in front of the shot. Liam Fontaine’s header from a Gardyne free-kick was then held by Tomas Cerny as Thistle looked to weather the storm, but just before half-time their brittle back door was blown clean off its hinges.

A speculative looping ball was helped over the Thistle defence by Fontaine, and as the home players stood like statues in expectancy of an offside flag which never came, Billy McKay simply popped the ball beyond Cerny.

It was a nightmare goal for Thistle to concede, but a vital lifeline for the visitors who had looked all-but condemned to the Championship after Thistle’s opener.

As a result, County came out in the second half with the greater intent, and they were troubling the hosts with alarming frequency for the home support. The Thistle players and fans were doing their utmost to feed each other’s anxiety, with each slip on the field greeted with the intake of 4000 breaths, and none more so than when Danny Devine fluffed a clearance to present Gardyne with another decent opportunity, only to blaze over from the edge of the area.

As the clock ticked down, Thistle at last started to exert some pressure of their own, and substitutes Blair Spittal and Miles Storey combined for the latter to force a decent save from Fox, before the home side thought they had snatched it at the death.

A corner from Spittal was met by a flying Devine header that Fox did brilliantly to save, with Storey’s follow up effort bundled wide. There was a huge shout for a penalty from the resultant corner as the ball appeared to strike Ross Draper’s arm, but Kevin Clancy was unmoved.

The deflated murmur that greeted the final whistle told its own story, as both sets of supporters fell as quiet as they had all night.

“It leaves us fighting, and as long as it’s still mathematically possible we will continue to do that,” said County co-manager Steven Ferguson.

“It leaves us with a huge mountain to climb, but we’ve been trying to climb that for the last eight games.

“We need to get six points and hope things go for us elsewhere. We can look at all the permutations, but six points gives us a real fighting chance – anything other than that and we are really in the lap of the gods.”

Scorers:

PARTICK THISTLE: Erskine (21’)

ROSS COUNTY: McKay (42’)

Referee: Kevin Clancy

Attendance: 4312