Chance to face Inverness is not added incentive, insists Partick boss Caldwell
Partick Thistle boss Gary Caldwell insists the chance to play fellow Championship side Inverness in the Scottish Cup semi-final offers no added incentive against Hearts on Tuesday night.
The Jags travel to Tynecastle for the quarter-final replay after a hard-fought 1-1 draw at the Energy Check stadium at Firhill on March 4.
Caldwell, buoyed by the 2-1 home win over Dundee United at the weekend which took them off the bottom of the table, is focused only on the Jambos, who sit in fifth place in the Ladbrokes Premiership.
The incentive is to get to a semi-final at Hampden,'' said the Jags manager.
Should we get there we will prepare and focus on Inverness at that time.
We know they are a very good team because we are in the league with them and I actually saw them at Dundee United in the quarter-final and they were outstanding.
It is an opportunity to get to a semi-final and the challenge we face is big enough, to worry about what will happen in the next round.''
Caldwell admits the win over the Taysiders, thanks to a last-gasp goal by Aidan Fitzpatrick, was the perfect'' build-up for the game against Hearts.
The former Wigan and Chesterfield boss said: I think it will be massive in terms of their spirits and confidence levels.
Obviously that lifts us up, we are still very much in a position we don't want to be in but in terms of a cup game you couldn't ask for any better preparation.
They gave it their all (against Hearts in the first game), I just think their composure in the first half hour could have been better.
Hearts are a physical team, they make you defend and we did defend extremely well for the whole game.
I felt the game plan worked, I felt we restricted them to very few chances, they only had three shots on target and we have to do that again but bring more composure and quality to the game and I think we can hurt them more.''