Stephen Robinson admits his first year in Paisley has served him up the toughest tests of his managerial career. But the Saints boss insists all the pain and strife will be well worth it if the club smash their way to the top-six finish they’ve been craving for nearly four decades.
Robinson replaced Jim Goodwin in February last year expecting a serious challenge to pull off St Mirren’s first top-half finish in the top flight since 1985.
Little did he know that as well as that pressure to perform on the park, he’d also inherit a seriously challenging financial situation off it to safely navigate through. A £1.6million loss in their most recent financial statement laid bare the kind of issues Robinson was having to wrangle with behind closed doors.
Nevertheless, the resurgent Buddies have responded magnificently on the park. Now fifth in the Premiership table, a win against St Johnstone this afternoon would strengthen their case for a top-six finish even further with just six games remaining before the split.
And despite reaching cup finals and securing European football at Motherwell, Robinson is adamant that would represent his greatest achievement in the dugout to date.
When asked to sum up his first year at the helm, Robinson told Renfrewshire Live Sport: “It’s been a bit of a roller-coaster because there have been a lot of challenges. We’re now coming out the other side of that financially, so it’s nice to see the togetherness here.
“When I first came in everyone was pulling in different directions. But it’s good to see that the fans, the directors, the players and the staff all now believe in what we’re doing. They’ve bought into it.
“We were third from bottom in April and it was a difficult time. It was a struggle for six or seven months, but we now see light at the end of the tunnel.
“To be honest, it’s been the most challenging year of my career. There are a lot of things people don’t get to hear about, but we just quietly get on with the job with good people in place, which can only bode well.
“When you consider the redundancies we’ve had in the last 12 months, it’s horrible for everybody when people are losing their jobs. I certainly hadn’t expected to come into that situation, but we’ve dealt with it and our staff have been incredible.
“The board have done all they can to get the club back on to the straight and narrow and we’re now asking how we can build, how we can progress.
“But if we were to finish in the top-six this season then, given the circumstances we’ve had to work under, that would represent the biggest achievement of my career.
“I’ve finished higher in the league. I’ve got into Europe, got to cup finals, European Championships too coaching-wise.
“But, in terms of the challenges we have faced, this would be a fantastic achievement for everyone concerned from the board down.”
To make that top-six dream a reality, the Buddies need to keep picking up points on the road ahead of the split – a feat that hasn’t proved easy.
Robinson admits it baffles him that Saints haven’t enjoyed as much success away from Paisley, despite their counter-attacking style being arguably better suited for the task.
They have begun to see small gains in that department, though, which gives the gaffer hope for today’s trip to McDiarmid Park.
Robinson said: “Our away form has improved since the World Cup break. Aberdeen was a fantastic result [a 3-1 win]. Killie and Livi we took great points on difficult surfaces. We are not as good at home for reasons that are hard to point to. It really is. Things haven’t gone our way.
“We were poor for 20 minutes at Well and were punished. We can’t start like that away from home. We need to start the way we did at home to Ross County and, if we do that, we can take the game to people.
“Fine margins have gone against us away from home. We have to try and turn them around.
“We set up the same way and the system should actually be better away from home, but football is not always black and white or as simple as that and it hasn’t been.
“It’s something we need to aim to improve, even the small margins we have found from the break will see us, if we continue our home form, get into that top-six.
“If we can get another result against St Johnstone, the narrative changes. It’d be two wins and two draws away since the break and then the away form seems good.”
Robinson will still be without a number of key players for the trip to Perth, with Declan Gallagher joining a host of stars missing including Jonah Ayunga, Alex Greive and Keanu Baccus.
He added: “We’re one in, one out. Declan won’t be fit. He’s not as bad as first feared, two or three weeks max with a hamstring complaint.
“Keanu and Scott Tanser we don’t think will quite make it. It’s come a few days too soon for them.
“Alex Gogic trained yesterday [Thursday] though so at least he can replace Dec. We’ll have a young, experienced bench but there’s quality there. We need to get these kids up to first team standard.”
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