McAusland Ready For Responsibility

Photo by Jeff Holmes St Mirren defender Marc McAusland has vowed to embrace his increased responsibility on the park after Jim Goodwin joined Steven Thompson on the sidelines. McAusland has been captaining the team in recent weeks with Thompson still about a month away from returning from groin surgery. The 26-year-old will lead Saints out against Partick Thistle on Saturday without player-coach Jim Goodwin beside him after his fellow defender was given a three-match ban for elbowing Dundee United forward Aidan Connolly. With the likes of Isaac Osbourne and Gregg Wylde also missing through injury, it could be a very young team that plays and McAusland knows he needs to set an example. The centre-back said: "With big Thommo being out for the whole season, that's a big loss for us, on and off the park. He's a massive leader and I think that has been shown in results. "But it's not just down to one person. We all need to pitch in and do our bit and hopefully we can start picking up results sooner rather than later. "I've been here a few years now and I'm now one of the more senior players in the squad. "We do have a really young squad. The young boys definitely need to look up to me and I need to be putting on a performance as well and hopefully dragging the boys through. "If I'm playing well hopefully the rest of the team can play well and we can get results." Tommy Craig's team go into the game on eight points, four behind Thistle in the Scottish Premiership, but McAusland feels they are close to picking up more wins. "The people who have been coming to see us will know we have been playing good football but we just can't get a run of results together," he said. "I'm sure it's going to come at some point. "We've not won a game yet at home which is disappointing for the fans as well as ourselves, but this is another chance for us and it's down to us and how we perform."