East Kilbride Thistle boss blasts 'worst pitch he's ever seen' at Royal Albert

dailyrecord.co.uk:

East Kilbride Thistle player-boss Aaron Connolly branded Royal Albert’s pitch the worst he’s ever seen in his non-league career after his side earned a hard-fought win at Tileworks Park.The Jags had to come from a goal down to claim a 2-1 victory on Saturday and Connolly reckoned it was an impressive feat, given the conditions they had to play in.Having gone 1-0 down inside the opening few minutes, Thistle rallied and goals from Liam McLaughlin and Adam Edgar gave them victory.But Connolly said: “It looks like a game we should go and win because it’s against the team at the bottom of the table but when you add some context to it terms of the pitch - which, no disrespect to Royal Albert, is the worst I’ve ever seen in my 10-15 years in junior football - I’m really proud of the players.“It was a really poor surface, heavy, cut up, really long and it made it difficult for us to play football.“But credit to the players for getting the ball down to try and play in the style we’ve been trying to hammer home to them.“We conceded a freak goal early on after a mistake in the box, but the players just kept trying to play football the way we want them to.“They kept trying to get the ball down and play, despite it being a really difficult pitch.“We were a goal down but we didn’t panic and they kept going with what we’ve been working on.“To go and get the win was just rewards for that and the manner in which the win came along for us was massive.”The result puts Thistle eighth in the West of Scotland League Third Division, with six wins in 16 games.One of the most pleasing aspects for Connolly was seeing their youth players flourish.He added: “We had four teenagers starting the game - two of them for the first time - so that was