IT has been quite a season for Jamie Sneddon. Between establishing himself as Partick Thistle’s first-choice goalkeeper, winning a trio of player of the month awards and setting a club record for consecutive clean sheets, he has plenty of successes to look back on.
Yet another arrived on Thursday as the 24-year-old was bestowed with the club’s player of the year award but the shot-stopper isn’t finished yet. With a trip to Somerset Park to look forward to on Friday night – one where only an eight-goal swing and a defeat coupled with a Raith win over Kilmarnock would deny the Jags a place in the promotion play-offs – there is still one final match of the regular season to go, and one last record up for grabs.
Last week’s 1-0 win over Dunfermline saw the Thistle team record a 17th clean sheet in the league this term, matching a club record. Secure another shut-out against Ayr, and Sneddon will have one more notch on his belt.
“It’s definitely something to keep in mind going into Friday but you want to keep a clean sheet in every game,” said Sneddon, voted by Thistle fans as their McCrea Financial Services Player of the Year. “I will prepare as normal, as will the rest of the squad, and hopefully we can get one more.
“It would be some achievement but if it’s not to be it’s not the end of the world. It would be nice to get one more.
“Definitely [it has been a transformative year]. It is the first season of my career where I have been playing every week so that in itself has been a big change.
“Overall I’m happy with my performances and I feel I’ve improved little aspects of my game. I have matured a bit and played a full season in a good team, which has been really enjoyable.”
That upturn in performances on the park has lifted the goalkeeper’s mood off of it. Sneddon admits there were times in the past where a poor performance led to a week of soul-searching but he has learned to take the good with the bad. Not allowing 90 minutes on a Saturday afternoon to dictate his mood for the week, he says, has been a positive development.
“It does, I can’t lie,” Sneddon said. “I was going through quite a hard time before the last couple of seasons when everything started going well. The downs of football are tough but during that time I looked for ways to move away from it because you don’t want your whole life to depend if things are going well on the pitch.
“That’s something I’ve tried to stick with this year even though things have been going well. I try not to get too high or too low. You need to realise that there is more to life than football but it does give you a lift when you play well on the Saturday.”
Sneddon was pleased to earn his club’s top honours and the Thistle keeper was also happy to see a hero of his also gain recognition for an impressive campaign: Craig Gordon, Hearts’ age-defying 39-year-old goalie.
“It’s just mental – I’ll be amazed if he doesn’t win player of the year,” Sneddon said. “I don’t think anyone in Scotland has had a bigger influence over a team as a single individual than him.
“He has won Hearts games single-handedly and his highlights reel this season will be ridiculous. It just shows you – he is getting better with age as a goalkeeper and he is flying. He is a real inspiration.
“I see the Hearts highlights every week and you try to pick up wee tips here and there at what he does technique-wise. That’s what I tried to do growing up – carry myself and handle myself the same way he did and copy everything he did. I’m not quite as good as him sadly. He’s just different class.”
Partick Thistle's Player of the Year Award for season 2021/22 is proudly sponsored by McCrea Financial Services - visit www.mccreafs.co.uk to find out more.
