Steven Lawless shows his value to Partick with late strike against Motherwell

Steven Lawless showed why Partick Thistle manager Alan Archibald was so keen to keep him during the transfer window as he struck a stoppage-time winner against Motherwell.

Lawless was the subject of interest from Dundee United, whose wide midfielder Chris Erskine has signed a pre-contract at Firhill.

But Archibald was not interested in any deal and Lawless showed why when he volleyed a deflected goal after a poor 90 minutes of action to earn Thistle a 1-0 win and move them above Motherwell and two points off the top six of the Premiership.

Archibald said: I didn't want to lose a good player. Stevie has played 95 per cent of our games and is a real creative force, even by creating space for others.

I was adamant I didn't want to let any of our good players go. It sends out the wrong signal to the dressing room and other clubs.

Steven will take his time. We've made him an offer and he'll have others, he knows what we think of him. The good thing is he gets to play here in a way he likes and we likes, and I think he'll take that into consideration. He'll have a few admirers.''

Archibald added: It's a massive win and it means we are looking up the way rather than down.''

Motherwell manager Mark McGhee felt it was ludicrous'' that Thistle midfielder Abdul Osman was not shown a second yellow card for a high challenge on Keith Lasley with 10 minutes left.

But he felt his team gave away a point. Although he did not name the culprit, it was clear he felt Lionel Ainsworth had failed to spot the danger before Lawless netted.

I thought we did enough to get something out of the game but unfortunately we are the team that has made the mistake,'' he said.

One of us has switched off, the boy has got in and got a shot. It was a big deflection but he should never have been able to get the shot away.

We have sold the game really. It was avoidable with a bit more alertness.

If they had 10 men and the same thing happened, we would still have lost the game.''