Stephen Robinson praises St Mirren character after win over Livingston

Stephen Robinson praised the character of his St Mirren side after they bounced back from their crushing defeat to Dundee by defeating Livingston in the cinch Premiership.

Sean Kelly’s first-half own goal settled a hard-fought encounter in which Saints passed up a number of good chances to win by a greater margin.

Robinson’s team remain third in the table having ended a run of three games without a win and now hold a two-point advantage over Hearts and sit four in front of Hibernian.

“I’m delighted, it was a really, really tough game,” Robinson said.

“It’s a tough game that we’ve come out on top of, we’ve reset ourselves, it was tough after a 4-0 defeat and it shows great character from the boys.

“When you play Livi it’s a battle, it’s a scrap and the game is reduced to longer balls. You have to land on seconds and you have to be physical – I think we’ve done that.

“The pitch was slippy, really hard to play on and a cold day – it’s those days that you show your character and I think we’ve done that in abundance today.

“We’ve shown character, a grit and steely determination to see the game out – and should have won maybe by more in the end on the counter attack but for our decision making.”

Robinson is hopeful he will not be without the services of Richard Taylor for an extended period of time after the defender was taken off on a stretcher with what appeared to be a nasty looking ankle injury.

The Buddies gaffer reckons Taylor is a major doubt for Tuesday’s trip to Ross County but could come back into the reckoning in the near future.

“It’s not as bad as it looked I don’t think, he walked off the stretcher afterwards,” he said.

“We’re hopeful, Tuesday might be a push but we’re hopeful it isn’t too serious.”

David Martindale felt his Livingston side failed to do enough to merit taking anything from their trip to the SMISA Stadium.

Livingston have slumped to the foot of the table following their sixth successive Premiership defeat.

“I don’t feel like we should have got something from the game but that’s me probably sitting with the negative hat on because we’re not picking points up,” Martindale said.

“We all know the basic fundamentals are that we need to start picking points up as quickly as possible.

“I try not to think too much about luck, I’m a great believer that you get what you work for in life and you’ve got to try to keep your head down and working hard.”