Saints seek Love Street send-off

By Martin Conaghan

The St Mirren players were celebrating survival last season

Gus MacPherson certainly knows a thing or two about hanging on for dear life at the bottom of the Scottish Premier League table.

The Buddies' boss pulled off a nail-biting finish on the penultimate day of last season, recovering from 2-0 down to win 3-2 away to Motherwell.

Meanwhile, Stephen Kenny was lamenting Dunfermline's 2-1 crash in the last minute away to Inverness.

MacPherson will undoubtedly be keen to avoid another nightmare dash to the finish line as the new season dawns.

With only eight league wins under his belt during the whole of last season - five of those arriving before the end of September - it's no wonder the Paisley side were helping prop up the bottom end of the SPL table for so long.

And, with more players departing the club during the close season than arriving, it's going to be an uphill struggle for a side that will be starting off from the wrong end of the table - and not just alphabetically-speaking.

But there's a few shafts of light at the end of that dark tunnel on Love Street, not least of all the introduction of seasoned campaigner Craig Dargo.

Gus MacPherson has attracted Craig Dargo to St Mirren Park

The 29-year-old striker joined MacPherson's side on a free transfer in June - having bagged 31 goals for Inverness Caledonian Thistle in just two seasons - and should compensate for the loss of John Sutton, who moved down south to Wycombe Wanderers.

It's easy to be critical of a relatively small club like St Mirren, especially when the bigger outfits are out splashing cash on multi-million pound signings and snatching all the pre-season headlines.

However, with the resources MacPherson has at his disposal, it was not only a major achievement for the Buddies to make it in to the SPL in the first place but an even greater one that they remain there for a second successive season.

It's certainly not going to be an easy ride, but with former Dunfermline midfielder Gary Mason and ex-Oldham defender Will Haining joining the fold, a comfortable slot somewhere up the ranks of the bottom six should be the top priority.

A decent run in the league and Scottish Cup wouldn't be out of the question and one or two minor Old Firm upsets would provide a much-needed confidence booster.

The punishing defeats metted out by the three sides finishing at the top of the SPL contributed in part to St Mirren's downfall last season, but the toughest challenge for the Buddies will come from their peers in the bottom six of the table.

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Gretna will be an unknown quantity, having never tasted the pace of the top-flight division, while Motherwell will be out to exorcise the ghosts of last season.

Dundee United will undoubtedly have bigger fish to fry, given their change in fortunes since the arrival of Craig Levein.

More importantly, this will be the last-ever season at St Mirren Park before the 113-year-old stadium makes way for a Love Street supermarket.

It just wouldn't seem right if the first-ever match on Greenhill Road was a First Division fixture.