Better Late Than Never

21 October 2012 16:14
St Johnstone contimnued their winning run but it was close

You have to go back to the early seventies to find a run of six wins in a row in the St Johnstone record books. Saturday's 2-1 win over Kilmarnock would have been easier if  Nigel Hasselbaink hadn't missed a chance to score just on the hour mark. The Dutchman did get on the score sheet in the last minute but he was happier that three points were secured more than anything else. The Dutch youngster was guilty of failing  to score into an empty net from just six yards. Instead, the ball bounced horribly off his shin and slipped wide of the target. He had to wait till the 90th minute to add to Murray Davidson's first-half opener for Steve Lomas' side. His goal proved vitals as James Fowler's deflected goal just moments after gave Kilmarnock hope before time ran out. Hasselbaink said: "It was just a bad miss for me, but it's happened and it's in the past now. I just had to be focused. You miss one, you miss two but you just have to say to yourself 'the goals coming, the goals coming'. I stayed focused and I got my goal. I took a bad touch. If it happened in the midfield it's okay, but it happened in front of the goal and it was a bad miss. If I had touched it with my left foot it would have been in, I was just two metres from the goal. It was important because Kilmarnock scored right after. I was scared for the few minutes after they scored but the team did well. We've now won five games in a row in the SPL and everybody in the dressing room is happy. It was good that I scored but it was most important that we got the three points. There's a very good team spirit at the club. Everyone was saying in the dressing room that we needed to win this game to go into second place in the table. The gaffer told us that it had never happened that we had won five times in a row in the Premier League, so that was a good aim for the boys, to push up and show we can do it with this squad." Fowler's deflected drive from the edge of the box in added time deceived Alan Mannus but it was too little too late but Rugby Park manager Kenny Shiels was left to rue a Cillian Sheridan free-kick that crashed back off the post seven minutes before the interval. He said: "I see positive things, that maybe others don't see. But I certainly saw some positivity there and the free-kick would have been a massive turning point."

Source: ScottishFitba

Source: FOOTYMAD