KILMARNOCK'S plight has given Motherwell fresh hope.
The Rugby Park side are being pulled down the table towards the play-off place like a sliver of metal edging ever closer to a magnet. Kilmarnock's loss at Fir Park on Friday night was their seventh in succession and there seems almost an inevitability about their fate just as there was with Hibernian last year.
Their lead over 11th-placed Motherwell is now just three points and chances are Gary Locke's side will need to pick up something from their two remaining matches to ensure they don't become the Premiership's representative in the play-off final.
It is an increasingly desperate situation but all hope is not lost. Kilmarnock can still shape their own destiny, starting with Saturday's trip to Partick Thistle. Jamie Hamill, one of the more experienced figures in the squad, was honest enough to admit a vast improvement is required but also felt it was not beyond Kilmarnock to belatedly summon the strength of character to make it happen.
"We have put ourselves in this position and we need to get ourselves out of it," said the midfielder. "The blame lies with the players in the dressing room. We need to get out of this situation. But at least we are still three points ahead of Motherwell.
"The manager has said he believes there is enough courage and bottle in the dressing room and we need to prove him right. At the end of the day, it is up to us. The gaffer can do the tactics and everything else but we have a good group of players and hopefully we have enough to get the next two results.
"In the past six or seven weeks the results haven't been good enough. We've just been needing that one victory and we've been saying that for weeks. We've just not been able to get it.
"A club like Kilmarnock should not be involved in this situation - we should be at the other end of the table. We didn't really see this coming but if you don't win games then you end up at the bottom of the league."
Their struggles have given fresh heart to a Motherwell side who had become almost resigned to the play-offs. Now there is an opportunity again. They will likely need to take at least four points from their last two matches to survive but striker Scott McDonald is not ruling anything out.
"We are a little bit closer, not that we can see light at the end of the tunnel right now, but hopefully if we keep doing what we are doing it will take us where we want to be in two games' time," said the Australian. "Everyone is pulling in the right direction. We've been good at home since I came back to the club, it's the away form we need to look at.
"Next it's St Mirren and now they're down they'll have the freedom to play. It won't be easy going there next week. But you'd like to think beating Kilmarnock will give us all a lift."
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