Craig Levein cheered to see St Johnstone ‘trying really hard’ in survival battle

St Johnstone boss Craig Levein expects his side to fight to the bitter end as they bid to avoid finishing in the relegation play-off spot.

Saints sit one point above 11th-placed Ross County in the cinch Premiership table ahead of Saturday’s clash with Hibernian.

Levein was encouraged by his team’s performance in last weekend’s defeat by Dundee and hopes a similar showing at Easter Road can bring better rewards.

“Certainly the Dundee performance was one of our better ones recently, I was really pleased with the way we played,” said Levein.

“It’s terribly annoying when you’re playing well and you lose a match. But it’s football and sometimes you don’t get what you deserve. The lads are together and they’re working really hard.

“If they’d thrown the towel in, everybody would see it, so that hasn’t happened and I don’t expect that to happen at all, I expect them to keep doing what they’ve been doing, trying really hard.

“We get some really good football in spells, I’d just like to get more of that to give us better chances of winning matches.”

Levein has no new injuries to worry about, while Drey Wright, Cammy MacPherson and Diallang Jaiyesimi are all making good progress in their recoveries.

Saints sit three places and 10 points behind Hibs but can draw on positive memories having won the reverse fixture in December.

“Tough match,” said Levein. “They’ve got some really good attacking players, they’re an attack-minded side. We’ll have to be at our best in terms of concentration to make sure we don’t make mistakes and give them opportunities.

“After that I’d like us to play as well in an attacking sense as we did against Dundee. And hopefully we can score more goals and take the points.”