Partick Thistle manager Mark Wilson is relishing the expectation surrounding his side after they began their Scottish Championship campaign with a hard-fought 1-0 victory over Morton.

A late winner secured all three points for the Jags at Cappielow, with Wilson believing his side deserved the result after creating the better opportunities throughout the afternoon.

“I thought we deserved the three points, certainly, with the chances and obviously hitting the woodwork three times,” Wilson said.

“I thought first half we were a wee bit slack. We were stuffy and maybe the dry pitch slowed us down a little bit. We spoke about speeding things up in the second half and making more runs in behind, and I thought the players did that.

“When we made the changes, Morton became a wee bit stretched and that played into our hands. We got the goal that we deserved.”

Much of the pre-season discussion has centred around Thistle’s prospects of challenging for promotion after an impressive end to last season, and Wilson has no issue with his team carrying that expectation into the new campaign.

“I don’t mind it at all,” he said when asked about being branded promotion favourites.

“I quite enjoy that because it shows the good work that we did last season and that people have sat up and taken notice.

“We were a wee bit of an unknown quantity last season, but as the season went on we pushed all the way and showed up well in the play-offs and against Premiership teams in the cup. You could see that things were progressing.”

Rather than trying to play down expectations, Wilson believes they are recognition of the progress made since taking charge, although he accepts the challenge now is coping with the pressure that comes with being one of the teams expected to compete at the top of the division.

“I’d probably be unhappy if people didn’t think we were good enough to challenge at the top end.

“It’s a different challenge for me and the players now to deal with that pressure. I’ve been there in my career before and I quite enjoyed it. It gives you a real focus every game.

“You can’t go out there thinking this is going to be easy. We’re going to have another 35 games like this that will be really tough. It’s up to us to come up with solutions, keep everybody fit, keep everybody happy and go as far as we can.”

Wilson was also quick to dismiss any suggestion that victory over Morton had been expected, particularly given the hosts’ difficult summer.

“I never ever thought it was going to be easy,” he said.

“I was here last week against Inverness and heard all the nonsense that this would be easy for us. No chance.

“It’s a derby and there’s a bit of needle in it. Morton players are fighting for every scrap and I said that to our players, we’ve got to fight as well.

“Every game I’ve been involved in between Thistle and Morton has been decided by one goal. It’s always tight and I was under no illusions that today would be the same.”

The victory represents an improvement on Thistle’s start to last season, when they collected just one point from their opening two league matches, and Wilson believes his squad depth will be a significant asset over the course of the campaign.

“The way we’ve managed the Premier Sports Cup, that’s been the case. We’ve dovetailed the front players nicely.

“This year I didn’t want us to be short in those areas, so when players left the club we replaced them quickly with players who were fit and ready to go. You can see the benefit in the first game of the season because it’s important to get off to a good start.”