Saints head north to Pittodrie

The penultimate match before the Scottish Premiership split sees Saints travel up the A90 to take on Aberdeen at Pittodrie, with the club still in with a mathematical chance of securing a top six finish. Nothing but a win will keep the hopes alive and a positive result in Aberdeen will pile the pressure on Hearts who take on Tayside rivals Dundee on Sunday lunchtime.

Saints will be looking to improve on the two defeats suffered at the hands of the Dons earlier in the season, going down 3-0 in both games at Pittodrie and McDiarmid Park respectively. An Adam Rooney hat-trick sent Saints back down the road pointless back in September and in December, Derek McInnes’ side were the visitors to Perth and won by the same score line.

Prior to this season, Saints had gone two league campaigns without losing away to Aberdeen at Pittodrie so there is definitely some cause for optimism ahead of the clash. The squad come into the game on the back of a solid 1-0 victory at home to Hamilton on Wednesday and will be hoping to keep the momentum going as we head into the final stages of the Scottish Premiership season.

Speaking the morning after the win against Accies, Saints manager Tommy Wright was happy to report that there are no new injury concerns ahead of Saturday’s match and that two more players will be in contention to be in the match day squad.

“There were no injuries from the Hamilton game which is obviously a huge positive,” Tommy said.

“There were a few bumps and bruises as you can expect from any game but nothing to give us any cause for concern.

“David Wotherspoon will come back into the squad after being suspended on Wednesday night and Richard Foster has managed to get another couple of sessions under his belt so he’ll be back in contention for the Aberdeen game too which is good news.

“It’s been a pleasant surprise to have Richard back so quickly. Different players seem to have knack of recovering quicker and ahead of schedule. Steven Anderson is another one who seems to defy medical science – if you’re looking at a six week layoff he’s back in three!

“From the scans when Richard first picked up the injury, we were told twelve weeks which put him out until bang on the 12th May. To get him back involved so quickly is a massive bonus to the squad for the run-in.”

The players were put through a recovery session on Thursday morning and the manager admits that there won’t be anything strenuous done on the training pitch between now and Saturday.

“When you’ve got two games coming so close together it’s a case of getting the right recovery work done and the ones who played last night were doing a pool session on Thursday morning. We won’t do much in the way of physical training on the Friday either and the focus will be more on talking about how we’re going to approach the game on Saturday.

“At this stage in the season the players are mentally and physically fine, especially after a short international break.”

Following the two 3-0 defeats inflicted on Saints by the Dons earlier this season, Tommy is hoping that the disappointment of those losses will spur his players on to get a positive result on Saturday. And with the club still harbouring an outside chance of making the top six, the manager has his eyes set on taking all three points at Pittodrie.

“We’ve had some poor defeats this season,” Tommy stated, “but I’d say two of our worst performances we’ve had overall came against Aberdeen home and away.

“For the first 45 minutes of the away game we were very, very poor and in the home game we started the game badly and gifted them a 2-0 lead before we even got into the game. This season we haven’t nearly done well enough when playing against them and when you don’t perform to your best against good teams you get punished.

“Aberdeen punished us both times we’ve played them this year so we’re hoping we can make it a lot more difficult for them on Saturday. The fact that we’ve had a game this week while they’ve not could work in our favour, and they’ve had a number of players away on international duty which can definitely affect a squad.

“Of all of the defeats we’ve had this season I think the two against Aberdeen have hurt the players the most. We go into the game knowing we have to win to keep any hopes of the top six alive so that in itself is a great incentive. It’s an important game and we’re going up there to try and win it.”

On Saints’ top six chances, the manager added: “It’s a remote chance and the odds are certainly stacked against us. Hearts only really need one point from their last two games due to goal difference. What a victory on Saturday does though is put pressure on Hearts ahead of their game with Dundee and that’s what we’re aiming to do.

“Even if we don’t make the top six, we want to finish the season as strongly as possible and that means securing 7th – so either way, we’re going to Aberdeen to try and come back down the road with all three points.”

*There is an SPFL Development League match at McDiarmid Park on Monday evening - 6pm kick off v Kilmarnock FC. Season tickets valid and cash admission of £5 and £2