St Johnstone will have to combat a Theo Bair with “fire in his belly”, according to Steven MacLean.
And the Perth boss knows from his own playing days that the motivation of the Motherwell striker, released by Saints in the summer, will be high at McDiarmid Park this weekend.
Bair has started every match for the Fir Park side in the Premiership.
He scored on day one of the league season at Dens Park and will be determined to add to that sole strike against the team who signed him from Canada in January, 2022 for the best part of £100,000.
“We know he will be up for it coming back here,” said MacLean, who informed Bair before the end of last season that he wouldn’t be in his plans if he saw out the last year of his contract in Perth.
Theo Bair opens his St.Johnstone account 💥
Continuing a solid start to the campaign, Bair was among the goals for St.Johnstone today, scoring his 1st goal for the club (and 1st in the SPFL) despite a 2-1 loss
Quite the GOLAZO, too. Great volley#CanMNTpic.twitter.com/jTKJU9qpal
— Alexandre Gangué-Ruzic (@AlexGangueRuzic) October 6, 2022
“I’ve done it myself – gone back to my old clubs and scored, got pelters and loved it!
“Getting a bit of stick made me try even harder.
“It puts fire in your belly and it’ll be the same with Theo.
“He will be coming back to prove me wrong. To prove everyone wrong.
“And to prove what a good player he thinks he is.”
StatsBomb Motherwell and Saints comparison
Although Bair has become a regular starter for Motherwell, his StatsBomb data is largely similar to last season at McDiarmid Park and suggest that Stuart Kettlewell has yet to significantly reinvent the powerful forward, as he aimed to.
Bair’s numbers were better in six of 11 key attacking categories in 2022/23 compared to 2023/24, with the reverse being the case in five.
His lxG has dropped from 0.15 with Saints to 0.11 at Motherwell and xG assisted from 0.06 to 0.05.
When you put Bair’s season radar against the league average for his position, it’s in these two fields that the 24-year-old remains furthest behind the Premiership pack.
MacLean believes a “fresh start” was best for the Canadian forward.
He added: “I just didn’t see Theo in the team that I was trying to build.
“I have a lot of respect for Theo.
“He’s a great boy. It just didn’t work out for him here.
“Listen, he will maybe say he didn’t get his opportunity.
“But I think he did.
“That’s football sometimes, it happens.
“But there’s no issues there, we had a good relationship.
“He worked really hard.
“He’s played a lot of games for Motherwell and it’s probably what he needed – a fresh start.
"Feed the Bair" 🐻
Open all Mics pundit Stephen Craigan showed just how much he enjoyed Theo Bair's first goal for Motherwell in their 1-1 draw on Saturday with Dundee. pic.twitter.com/9cUXvBKELN
— BBC Sport Scotland (@BBCSportScot) August 7, 2023
“Sometimes as a player you don’t see your way into the team and he wanted a run of games.
“It wasn’t going to happen here.
“We wished him all the best and I wish him every success apart from against us.”
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