James Brown is desperate for St Johnstone to steer clear of a results rut and avoid anything close to the “horrible” situation the club found itself in last season.
Saturday afternoon’s loss at Livingston signalled a third straight defeat and meant ninth-placed Saints are now just one point off the bottom of the table.
Wing-back Brown understands the importance of quickly getting the winning feeling back to ensure the Perth side do not find themselves chasing their tail again.
Brown said: “We don’t want three results to turn into a rut. We don’t want to be in the position we were last year - it was horrible.
“We can talk about not wanting to be in that position but we need to go out and do it.
“We have enough boys here who went through a spell last year where we went a lot of games without getting a result. Three results like this need to stop quickly and we know that.”
Saints had carved out a couple of early chances at the weekend and Brown himself smashed the underside of the bar.
But he admitted the performance was nowhere near good enough after going a goal down.
“The first goal is massive,” he said. “We’ve lost seven games this season, six of them by one goal.
“Credit to Livingston because they are good at what they do and make it difficult to get back into the game.
“We started bright enough but, from the goal, we were simply not good enough. There is no doubt about it, simple as, we were poor in the second half.
“It should not take us until the 80th minute to then start applying some level of pressure.
“When we went down a goal, we didn’t create enough problems for them. We didn’t do enough to get back in the game.
“If my strike goes in it could’ve been a different game. But it didn’t so it’s no excuse. We still needed to be better from the moment we conceded.”
The main positive from Saturday was that David Wotherspoon returned to first team duties for the first time in 11 months. He was used as a late substitute.
Brown said: “David had been out for nearly a year. It’s a real positive he is back in and the boys are delighted for him.
“If he can hit the heights we know he can moving forward, then he will be a massive player for us.
“We know he has great composure. He has never relied on his pace and is technically very good. He is the type of player who can get us up the pitch.
“We still have Graham Carey to come back too. We have a lot of quality in different areas.
“The competition will be good building up to the World Cup. We’ll need everyone to chip in with good performances.”
Saints now head for some Friday night under the lights football at Easter Road where they face a Hibs side hurting from a 6-1 defeat to Celtic.
“We’re more than capable of getting a result at Easter Road,” Brown insisted.
