St Mirren

Manager Stephen Robinson has been speaking to the media before St Mirren's Scottish Premiership trip to Livingston on Tuesday.

Here are the key lines:

• The St Mirren boss says it's "nice" to be linked with jobs, such as the vacant Aberdeen role, but his sole focus is on his team.

• Robinson insists speculation about his future "doesn't turn my head", saying: "I've been linked with every job in Scotland, England, Ireland."

• "What you also have to remember is somebody's lost their job, which is horrible," he adds. "It's a horrible industry. It's certainly not for me to talk about anybody else's job."

• Robinson says he cannot control reports and he is "certainly not complicating the job" he has in Paisley.

• "We need to do basics well here and that's my main focus," he says.

• The former Motherwell boss concedes St Mirren "are in a relegation battle" but winning their two games in hand could put them "on the verge of the top six again".

• On what he can achieve at St Mirren after multiple top-six finishes and cup glory, he adds: "The biggest thing that has to happen in this football club is staying in this division."

• "People get carried away with what we've done and how we've done it," he says. "But that doesn't change the fact that success is to stay in this division."

Watch highlights as in-form Motherwell dispatch St Mirren in a comfortable Scottish Premiership victory.

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Douglas: Worst performance of the season by far. We made Motherwell look good but they did enough to beat a poor Saints side. Apart from George, everyone else played below par...well below. We could hardly string two passes together and on this form...two games in hand or not...we are not far off sliding deep into the mire.

John: Well beaten. (Pun intended). Lock the League Cup away, put the medals in the drawer and accept that we're in a relegation scrap. Livi away on Tuesday will be a battle and we don't seem to have the stomach for the fight. So disappointing, but not overly surprising. This happened back in 2013 following a cup win and it's almost as if the club has learned nothing.

James: Saints need new blood in midfield given the current long-term injuries they face in that area of the pitch plus a change up front given the overall lack of goals all season. They can't keep playing the same front men while hoping for a different outcome! Otherwise they will drop deeper into the relegation zone!

Douglas: Another game where you look back and rue your missed chances. In saying that we gifted an opening goal to 'Well and that came from really slack defensive work, which is not a Saints trait. Yes we are missing dependable players, but that is no excuse and we should be able to fill these gaps with those that step in, but the facts speak for themselves, 16 goals scored throughout the season, the lowest in the division, and that speaks volumes for where we are in the league, and the problem that needs to be addressed.

Peter: The manager described the performance very well, nobody else needs to comment on it. I actually believe that the players need to go down holding their heads when they are tackled and stay down, it seems to help other teams to get decisions. Four bookings for us and none for Motherwell was astonishing.

High-flying Motherwell sit two points behind Celtic and Rangers in the Scottish Premiership with a comfortable win against struggling St Mirren.

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St Mirren manager Stephen Robinson: "That's as poor a performance as we've put in all season.

"I didn't think Motherwell needed to do a whole lot to win the game. They were clinical, they defended when they needed to, we didn't. We didn't do what we're good at, we didn't have a lot of crosses into the box. We didn't do the simple things well enough and if you don't do that against an in-form team you don't deserve to win.

We need desperately to get players in, we've got three big players missing and it affects any team when you've got that level of player missing, especially ourselves.

"We didn't test them at all. We put one ball in behind them but had no end product. They allowed us to have the ball in front of them but the changes didn't really make the impact.

"You can't have 10 starting players not playing to the best of their abilities. We've got three players missing which had a big impact on that but the boys I expected to step up didn't today. We didn't deserve anything out of the game and we have to react to that very quickly because we've got another big game coming up.

"I'm not confident [on doing a lot of business in January]. It's a difficult window, you play massively over the odds. We're not anybody's first choice so you have to wait and hope. It's paramount we get players in, we're asking a lot from players who haven't played at this level. After a performance like that, we're certainly looking at all areas [of the pitch].

"We've got two games in hand but you still need to pick up the points in the games you're playing and we haven't been doing that.

"This is a huge battle now, it's a relegation battle. You can turn that round if you get a couple of wins but we need to start doing that quickly."

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Motherwell add Zimbabwe attacker Tawanda Maswanhise and on-loan Celtic defender Stephen Welsh following victory over the champions.

Regan Charles-Cook will miss eight weeks with an ankle injury.

Andy Halliday, Jordan McGhee and Aston Oxborough are closing in on returns while long-term absentees Filip Stuparevic (knee), Sam Nicholson (knee) and Zach Robinson (Achilles) remain out.

St Mirren have lost Jonah Ayunga (tendon) and Mark O'Hara (ankle) for two to three months, joining Keanu Baccus (hamstring tendon) on the sidelines.

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• Motherwell are unbeaten in their past six league meetings with St Mirren (W2 D4), although the past two have been drawn; these two sides last played out three successive league stalemates in August 2012.

• St Mirren have enjoyed just one win in their past eight league visits to Motherwell (D3 L4), a 1-0 victory in September 2023.

• Motherwell have failed to win their opening league fixture in each of the past five calendar years (D2 L3) since a 1-0 victory over Aberdeen in 2020.

• St Mirren have only won their first Scottish Premiership match of a calendar year once since 2019 (D2 L4), beating Dundee United 2-1 in 2022.

• St Mirren have the lowest shot conversion rate in the Scottish Premiership this season (7.1 per cent) while only Celtic (-10.1) have underperformed their xG more than the Buddies (-5.7 – 16 goals from 21.7 xG).

St Mirren have suffered a double injury blow after captain Mark O'Hara and Premier Sports Cup final hero Jonah Ayunga were both ruled out for at least two months.

Striker Ayunga - who scored twice against Celtic at Hampden - went off injured in Tuesday's defeat by Rangers, while O'Hara - who has not started a game since early November - has suffered a setback in training.

With Keanu Baccus also out with a long-term injury, the Buddies are down to the bare bones.

"Jonah's had a scan, not good news," manager Stephen Robinson said. "Jonah's going to be at least a couple of months out with a tendon injury.

"Mark O'Hara, who obviously had a foot problem, he got a kick in in the last minute of the training session before Rangers and he's going to be out the same, probably two to three months with an ankle injury.

"Keanu Baccus is obviously a longer term, two to three months as well. So big blows for us in terms of the injury front.

"Jonah was in good form as well, playing really, really well. But unfortunately, quite innocuous, he's pulled up in one of his runs at Ibrox and we had a scan very quickly. So unfortunately, when there's tendons involved in these injuries, you just can't take any chances or it ends up being surgery.

"Mark has got a couple of tears in his ankle ligaments from the incident in training as well.

"We try and make sure people step up and they've had their opportunities limited probably by the form of the people we're speaking about. So it's time for them to step up.

"They'll knock on my office door, they'll tell me they should be playing. So let's hope they do."

Robinson is keen to make January signings to boost his depleted squad and says he will have to use academy players to make up the numbers against Motherwell on Saturday.

"We're very, very low on bodies, even just to fill the bench," the Northern Irishman said. "It could be a couple of 16-year-olds in the squad – good 16-year-olds, by the way, Luke Douglas and Jack Lavery.

"But we are actively looking. We're speaking to people in the positions we're speaking about, the forward positions and midfield. But that's proven rather difficult at the moment to get people in. But we'll continue to do that and see where we can take it."

Sportscene pundits Scott Allan and Billy Dodds discuss St Mirren's performance in the 2-1 defeat against Rangers at Ibrox.

Watch the best of the action from Ibrox as Rangers - who visit Old Firm rivals Celtic on Saturday - narrowed the gap on the top two with a 2-1 win over St Mirren. (Available to UK users only)

Rangers secured their first win over St Mirren in more than a year to end 2025 within six points of Scottish Premiership leaders Hearts and within three of Celtic before Saturday's second Old Firm game of the season in the league.

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St Mirren boss Stephen Robinson tells BBC Scotland: "Real frustration with the two goals. We spoke about it and worked on the threat Fernandez has and we made two poor decisions for both goals.

"I didn't think Shamal had a whole lot to do and Jack Butland was man of the match. I thought we were excellent second half. Once we started believing, we dominated large parts of the game without Rangers being a major threat.

"People miss penalties. I think it's the first one Marcus has missed in his career. It isn't one person's fault. Our performance was very good second half, but we come away with nothing because we didn't do the easy bits of the game.

"We have what we have to work with. We have to be better in small moments."

Andrew Christie
Fan writer

The spectre of not being able to break down a low block is still looming over us like the big scary Muppet over Michael Caine last week.

Saturday was an annoyingly missed chance to prove we'd moved past it. Kilmarnock arrived second-bottom, winless since October and we knew exactly what was coming: 10 men behind the ball, compact lines, organised resistance. Yet, we couldn't find a way past it.

We dominated almost everything measurable. Possession. Territory. Entries into the final third. Forty-seven crosses. Eleven corners. If you'd looked at the heat maps afterward, the area around Killie's box would resemble Jackson Pollock's Walkman.

They defended deep. Lines squeezed tight, the space between defence and goalkeeper effectively theoretical. And to be fair, it was disciplined. Their shape rarely broke. Lanes were blocked, second balls contested, crosses met by a forest of bodies.

We moved the ball patiently, but the pattern became familiar: circulate, shift wide, cross, repeat. Against a block that compact, width alone isn't enough - you need the killer pass, the moment of genuine quality that forces defenders to move rather than simply absorb impact.

Chances did come. Dan Nlundulu's close-range effort is usually a goal, but Oluwayemi produced a reaction save worthy of any point. Score there and the game opens; Killie have to emerge, space appears, oxygen enters the match. We never got that breakthrough.

Jayden Richardson's introduction lifted the tempo. Conor McMenamin drifting centrally asked different questions. Effort was relentless. Structure held. And on a different day we could have been awarded a couple of penalties. What we lacked was incision: the cut-back instead of the cross, the disguised pass instead of the obvious one.

Two weeks ago - before Aberdeen, before the reset - this is a game we lose. Scrappy breakaway, collective wobble, frustration tipping into chaos as Kilmarnock briefly remember they're allowed in our half. Instead, we stayed composed. No overcommitting. No panic. Third clean sheet on the bounce. Five unbeaten.

This team is managing games better now. Controlling territory, limiting risk, refusing to self sabotage. If the loudest complaint is "we dominated but couldn't quite score", that's irritation, not crisis. Fine tuning, not fundamental failure.

Rangers on Tuesday will present a very different picture. They won't pitch a tent in their own box and refuse to engage with society. They have their own problems and will be anxious to remedy them in front of an easily turned Ibrox. But we go there unbeaten, organised, and carrying that cup-winning, Celtic-beating swagger.

The spectre remains.

But it's shrinking.

Andrew Christie can be found at Misery Hunters, external

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Rangers defender Nasser Djiga is on Africa Cup of Nations duty.

Oliver Antman, Nedim Bajrami, Derek Cornelius and Rabbi Matondo remain out.

St Mirren are missing the injured Keanu Baccus.

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• Rangers are winless in their last four league meetings with St Mirren (D2 L2); only in November 1904 and August 1984 have they ever gone five without a win over the Buddies.

• St Mirren won their last league visit to Rangers 2-0 in February last season, but have never won successive such trips, with this their 126th in league competition.

• Rangers have only lost their final league game once in the last eight calendar years (W5 D2), going down 2-1 to Celtic in 2023. When facing a side other than Old Firm rivals Celtic to round off a year, the Gers have only lost their final league game once in the last 31 years (W26 D4), losing 4-0 to Hibernian in the Scottish Championship in 2014.

• St Mirren have only won their final league game in one of the last five calendar years (D1 L3), beating Aberdeen 1-0 in 2023.

• Only Alexandros Kyziridis (45) has created more chances in the Scottish Premiership this season than both Rangers' James Tavernier (36) and St Mirren's Declan John (30).

Jonathan Sutherland
Sportscene presenter

Alex Gogic (St Mirren): Adept in both midfield and defence for St Mirren, another starting berth for this team of the week stalwart.

Clean sheet and more than played his part in the stalemate against Kilmarnock.

Watch highlights of St Mirren's 0-0 draw against Kilmarnock in the Scottish Premiership. (Available to UK users only)

We asked for your views on St Mirren's 0-0 draw against Kilmarnock.

Here's what some of you said:

Ali: Hard to compare to last year's post-Christmas game, an emphatic win against Rangers, this year's game feels like post-Christmas indigestion. We were nowhere near clinical enough on the finish but to the testament of Killie, they felt impossible to break through. Hopefully better luck and more clinical finishing at Ibrox next week.

John: Well, the post-cup final hangover finally arrived. We were poor in every department, forcing only one excellent save from the Killie keeper. The longer things went on at 0-0 the more the crowd became frustrated and anxious, fearing another last-minute nicking of all three points by Killie as per the recent Celtic game in Paisley. However, at least we took a point. In truth, that is all we deserved.

Stuart: Can't play this poorly against a second-bottom side if we want out of the relegation dogfight. With early and plenty of substitutions, Stephen Robinson is clearly just as frustrated as fans. Two penalty claims ignored so the referee is consistent at least.

Kilmarnock's long wait for a Scottish Premiership win has extended to nearly three months after a pulsating goalless draw at St Mirren.

Read the full match report here.

Have your say here.

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St Mirren boss Stephen Robinson: "Frustration [is the main emotion]. We had so much of the ball, so much of the build. Our final decision was the reason that we don't take all three points.

"We totally dominated the game. We didn't land a lot of second balls first-half but we still delivered loads of balls, 47 balls into the box, 47 crosses, and we haven't managed to get on the end of any of them.

"Some of the quality of them could be better. Some of the movement could be better. It's just frustrating that we got into really good areas, had a great chance, but their goalkeeper, makes a fantastic save.

"We deserved to win the game, I thought we had a lot of ownership of the game.

"Killie offered a threat on the counter-attack. They've got some good players at the top end of the pitch, but the overriding emotion is probably frustration with that amount of the ball, that amount of chances, that amount of crosses. But if you're not clinical, then you don't get the three points.

"The positive is we've gone five unbeaten now in all competitions, and that's our third clean sheet in a row in the league. So that's a real positive for us and we want to keep that run going."