Lewis Vaughan insists he has been through too much in his career already not to make the most of Raith Rovers’ Premiership opportunity.
The Stark’s Park favourite netted his 19th goal of the season in Tuesday’s play-off semi-final victory over Partick Thistle.
The 2-1 first-leg win at Firhill puts the Kirkcaldy outfit in pole position for Friday night’s return leg in Fife.
With a shot at promotion to the top-flight the prize at stake, Vaughan is determined to rise to the occasion again following his first-half stunner in Glasgow.
And the 28-year-old admits he knows from the painful experience of four career-threatening knee injury lay-offs that Raith need to grasp the chance they now have.
“I’ll never take a game of football for granted again,” he said, “especially playing in these massive games.
“These are the games you want to play in and I relish the pressure that comes with them.
“It makes me perform a little bit better.
“It’s up there with the biggest and most important games of my career.
‘Back to the Premiership’
“You never know what’s around the corner – in life, never mind football.
“So I take each game as it comes and hopefully by the end we can get this club back to the Premiership.”
One look at Vaughan’s record from this season is proof that he can peak when it matters most.
He has six outright winners, a hat-trick to complete a comeback against Ayr United, telling goals against Dundee United, Dunfermline and at Hampden, and penalties convincingly converted.
In previous years, there has been a Fife derby hat-trick, play-off strikes and a winner against boyhood heroes Hibernian.
At the same time, the popular forward is fully aware that just one goal for Partick at the other end of the pitch in the second-leg can put a whole different complexion on the tie.
“There was disappointment at losing the goal,” he said of the Firhill aftermath. “But if you’d offered us it [a 2-1 win] before the game we’d have snatched your hand off.
“Conceding the goal makes it a bit more interesting.
“Two-nil is a difficult lead in any game. Now, there is only one goal in it.
“If they score first then it changes the dynamic – but if we score it changes as well.
‘Fine margins’
“Football is a game of fine margins and they’re back in the tie, but we have a lead to defend.
“We beat them 4-3 earlier in the season and we led and then they led and that shows you how quickly things can change.”
Rovers skipper Scott Brown has argued that Thistle’s 72nd-minute strike from Blair Alston ‘may not be a bad thing’ for Ian Murray’s side .
It means there is no temptation to sit on the narrow advantage they will have at kick-off.
“For us, we need to go and win the game,” said Vaughan. “That was our goal in the first-leg, and we did that.
“I think we showed how good a team we are, especially in the first-half, going 2-0 up. So there’s no reason we can’t do the same again.
“I thought we were brilliant, everyone to a man was different class.
“They threw everything at us in the second-half, which was expected. And we dealt with it, to a certain degree.
“They got a goal back, which makes it interesting for the neutral.
“But we just need to take confidence from that first-half performance.”
