St Johnstone boss Tommy Wright is refusing to push any panic buttons at McDiarmid Park after the Perth club’s mixed start to the season.
A 2-1 loss at home to St Mirren last time out consigned them to a sixth defeat in nine league games, and leaves them in ninth spot ahead of this weekend’s fixture against Kilmarnock.
But Saints fans only need to look back to season 2012/13 for inspiration, when they failed to win any of their first seven competitive games before a famous victory over Celtic sparked a run of six straight victories.
“We’re just having a little bad run at the minute, but we’ve been here before and we’ve been here every season for the last three or four I can remember,” Wright commented.
“We’re only three points worse off than where we were last season. That’s where we are.
“But I think people look at league tables and think, disrespectfully, that Hamilton and Kilmarnock are at the wrong end of the table, and the likes of us who have been in the top six in recent years should be at the other end.
“But it doesn’t work like that. Of course we’re not happy that we’ve lost that many games so far in the league we can’t be, as a group.
“But we’re in it to work hard each day, come in and make sure we’re ready for the next game. There have been signs that our performances have improved, but not over 90 minutes.
“Even the St Mirren game, St Mirren probably had better control of the first half but we had the best chances of the game. We could quite easily been 3-1 up at half-time.
“There are little mistakes that we’re making and we’re getting punished, and there are opportunities arising that we’re not taking. We’re realistic to know that we’ve got to do better.
“The players know that, I know that, and we’ve got to work harder to get it right. And we will get it right.”
After almost every international break, managers are asked if the enforced lay-off has been a help or a hindrance and Wright is swaying towards the latter in this instance.
“I’d have liked to have had a game pretty quickly,” he explained.
“I don’t think you can look at the break and analyse it too much because when we won two games before the last break people were saying it came at a bad time for us.
“We’ve got a full week now to fully prepare and be ready for what’s going to be a tough game because Kilmarnock have started extremely well.
“They’ve grown in confidence as the season has gone on, the new players have fitted in well.
“But we’ve got to make sure we become a 90 minute team and the second half against St Mirren we dominated the game and really should have won the game.
“At the minute we’re not getting any breaks in terms of decisions. Even the BBC punditry which included a St Mirren player knew we should have had two goals.
“That’s costing us at the minute, little things are going wrong, but I’ve got a good set of players here.”
Wright revealed that long-term injury absentees Steven MacLean and Tam Scobbie paid a visit to McDiarmid last week and, although they are both still some way off returning to action, their presence was a morale boost in itself.
“Macca is still non weight bearing so he’s still on the crutches, and Scobbs has still got a brace on his knee so it’s still early stages in terms of their recovery,” he concluded.
“But they are in good spirits and they’ll just have to be patient and work hard, stay strong and get back, which they will do.”
Striker Chris Kane, who is currently on loan at Dumbarton, has also been nursing a knee injury of late, but Wright revealed he could get into full training by the end of the week.