St Peter’s bounced back from their dismal defeat to BSC by dishing out a lesson to Harthill.
Defender Gary Nuggent bagged the opener, his first ever goal for the club, before the Paisley club’s latest promoted under-20 prospect Luke Gilies doubled the hosts lead.
Also scoring on his debut was new signing Zach Taylor, who recently joined having left Rossvale. He put the icing on the cake with a fine finish before Harthill grabbed a late consolation strike.
St Peter’s boss Paul McTaggart was delighted with the response his side showed after putting in an abject performance in their previous match.
He told Express Sport: “The BSC game was brutal and it was the second match in a row we weren’t at the races at all.
“We had some fairly harsh words afterwards and a bit of a clear of the air and thankfully it worked as we were superb against Harthill.
“I couldn’t have asked for any more from the boys. It was a brilliant reaction after two very poor performances.
“Gary got his first goal with a great header and Luke put us further in control.
“We brought Zach in, who is still only 18, from Rossvale and he was different class.
“He gave their centre backs a torrid time and thoroughly deserved his goal.
“His link-up play was excellent and we’re very excited to see how he develops with us in the weeks ahead.”
While McTaggart is keen to take things one game at a time, he admits he can’t help but dream of catching up the two sides currently joint-top of the Division 4 table - Kilsyth Athletic and Finnart.
With both dropping points at the weekend, he believes his side still have a shot at catching them up - as long as they begin to show more consistency on the park themselves.
McTaggart said: “We were really chuffed with the result and the performance against Harthill but we’re not going to get too carried away.
“All of the teams above us dropped points at the weekend and it shows that anyone can beat anyone in this division.
“We’ve still got three games in hand on Finnart and two on Kilsyth, so all we can keep doing is getting points on the board and keeping the pressure up on them.
“We’ve got Harthill again this Saturday coming, this time away from home which will be a totally different prospect.
“They’ve got a tight, grass park which we’re expecting will be pretty wet and tricky to play on.
“It’ll be more of a battle but we showed on Saturday we’re not easily bullied.”
