Liam Craig rounded off a remarkable week by scoring the winner for St Johnstone against Hibs six days after Betfred Cup glory.
The veteran midfielder’s superb long-range effort early in the game was enough to secure three points for Saints, who will go into the last match before the Premiership spilt with a chance of top six football.
Callum Davidson’s men are up to seventh in the table, two points off sixth-placed St Mirren.
Unlike in the cup semi-final between these teams when Saints scored first it certainly wasn’t against the run of play this time.
They started better than their opponents and the 16th minute opener was a fair reward for their early control.
Craig started the move with a ball out to David Wotherspoon, whose lovely first touch opened up the possibility of picking out Callum Booth on the overlap.
From there, the left-back’s cross to the back post was only cleared as far as the edge of the box. Craig latched on to it and curled his shot past Ofir Marciano into the Hibs keeper’s bottom left corner.
As well as they played in the first half, there was a warning for Saints when Joe Newell should have scored (or picked out an un-marked Josh Doig outside him) shortly before the break.
There was an even better chance for Hibs 10 minutes into the second period when Paul Hanlon had a free header from a Martin Boyle cross six yards from goal but couldn’t keep it down.
It turned out to be a case of ‘what we have we hold’ for Saints.
Christian Doidge had a shot tipped over the bar by Zander Clark and Doig narrowly missed the target but a magnificent defensive effort saw the hosts through to victory.
