Simo Valakari: St Johnstone 'must stay in the race' to keep survival hopes alive

St Johnstone manager Simo Valakari has told his players they can’t waste any more time as they look to keep their hopes of avoiding relegation.

Last weekend’s 3-1 home defeat to Dundee left the Perth side rooted to the bottom of the Premiership table, eight points behind 11th-placed Hearts.

That prompted the St Johnstone board to issue a statement admitting the results hadn’t been good enough but insisting that nobody had given up on survival. They said they backed Valakari and were looking to strengthen his squad in the January window.

The manager admits the reality of their position is disappointing, and things have to improve quickly.

“Nobody wanted this, but it is the situation we are in now,” Valakari said.

“How I manage the situation, there’s no miracles, it’s just through hard work.

“We all, and I would be the first to admit it, we need to do things better. We still need to get our decisions and our mentality and everything just to be in a high level to win games in this league.

“As we have been saying to the players, we can’t be saying ‘I didn’t feel good today, I didn’t have the best game but next game I will have it’. We don’t have any more games to have that luxury.

“Now we have to treat every game like our last. We can’t keep drifting and drifting and drifting.

“We have to stay in this race.

“I know, knowing our players, that when we win, it’s important, but it doesn’t change anything. We’re still in this position and it’s still game by game and only this moment that counts.”

Work has been going on to bring in new recruits and Valakari is hopeful there could be a new face in the door before facing Rangers on Sunday.

However, he admitted the team’s results and position had made recruitment more difficult.

“Yes, 100 per cent, and no hiding (that fact),” Valakari said. “We have been, of course, as any club would, I believe. But I can only talk about our club. We have been working so hard before the transfer window to finalise the players and get them in.

“And then what happened this festive period (five defeats in the last six games) and we end up in the position where we are, many things didn’t come out.

“And I don’t blame the players because they see (the league position), they feel they have one career, they feel their reputation (could be impacted). Plus, I have to say, you need to be a tough guy to play in this position.

“So maybe to see the silver lining as well, if you were not ready to take this fight, you were not the right player to come to our club. But definitely, yes, it’s hard.”