PARS striker admitted he was unaware they had secured a play-off spot - but aims to build momentum going into them.

The on-loan Aberdeen player netted his seventh goal of a productive loan spell at East End in Saturday's 2-1 win over Brechin City, the team's first win in five matches.

A win at Airdrie could make certain of a second-placed finish if other results go their way and the 18-year-old told Press Sport that the squad have their sights set on clinching as many victories as possible in their final five league matches.

He said, "I didn't know that we'd confirmed it to be honest with you but we'll keep going as we want to be on a winning run going into the play-offs. We got a wee word at half-time on Saturday but thankfully we came back out and done the business as it was important to get a win again. It happens to teams that they go a few games without a win and hit a dip in form but I'd much rather we have it when we did rather than when we hit the play-offs.

"Hopefully we won't have another one and we can push on from here, starting on Saturday." Shankland continued, "After we lost to East Fife, we knew we'd let ourselves down and the gaffer made it known to us. It was important for ourselves to show that we're a better team that what we were against East fife and I thought we played well in the second half.

"My second game was at home to Airdrie when they beat us 1-0 so we know that we're in for a tough one on Saturday. In don't mind the astro pitch; I've played on it before when I was in the reserves at Queen's Park and it should be ideal for good footballing teams. I'm sure that if we can play as well as we can then we can get a result." Despite his parent club's success in the League Cup and continued involvement in the Scottish Cup, Shankland is fully focused on the challenge of winning promotion and said that he has been pleased with how his spell at East End has gone so far.

He commented, "I've just been keeping up with the results at Aberdeen as I'm more interested and concentrated on what's happening here. It's been brilliant for me as I've been getting good experience playing first team football and I've learned a lot working under the gaffer.

"I've scored seven goals which I'm pretty pleased with but the most important thing is the team performances. I went four games without a goal and strikers are judged on their goalscoring, so it was good to get one against East Fife and again on Saturday, so long may it continue. It's in the back of your mind if you're not scoring but you need to keep going. It wasn't going my way for a while but once you get one they start going in again.

"We've kept close as a squad and fought through it. We're always confident and hopefully we can go on and win a few games taking us into the play-offs."