Chris Johnston, the Kilmarnock winger, has dismissed any suggestion that the ongoing row over bonuses at Rugby Park could affect his side's performance in Perth this afternoon.
Kilmarnock take on St Johnstone having risen to fourth place in the SPFL Premiership table, but the visiting players' preparations were overshadowed by a disagreement with Michael Johnston.
The Kilmarnock chairman has offered the squad a bonus package of £20,000 should they finish at least 10th in the table this season - the money is to then be shared among the first-team players - a proposal which this week led to a meeting with members of the side who deem that amount insufficient. Johnston issued a statement following the meeting and claimed the players "understood" the reason that only £20,000 was on offer, only for PFA Scotland, the players' union, to reiterate that the Kilmarnock players were still not satisfied and are "considering their position".
Chris Johnston acknowledged this week, however, that the only position on the minds of his team-mates his second in the league table, with Kilmarnock able to leapfrog both Inverness Caledonian Thistle and Dundee United with a victory this afternoon.
"It won't have an impact on what we do on the park," the 20-year-old said. "Things have been going on behind closed doors for a wee while but we have still been going out and getting results. It's not been affecting us in terms of results. We are just concentrating on winning games and moving up the table because that is all we can do."
Johnston is not the only youngster impressing for the Ayrshire side this season; midfielder Robbie Muirhead impressed enough to gain a call up to the Scotland Under-19s squad last week and he made the most of his opportunity by scoring from 40 yards in a 1-1 draw with Norway.
"Robbie has got some strike on him and is always trying stuff in training and games," said Johnston. "He has got a lot about him."
There was once a similar opinion held about Mark Connolly, not least by himself. The defender was sent on loan to St Johnstone as a teenager four years ago having first been signed by Bolton Wanderers for £1m, but he failed to make a first-team appearance and left the Perth club after questions were raised about his attitude.
Now 22, Connolly made a return to Scottish football in the summer after signing for Kilmarnock and has impressed with a series of mature performances. He will be back in Perth today and there are some among the home side who are curious to see how far the defender has come.
"When Mark came in here maybe he had a bit of ego, coming up from Bolton with a million pound fee on his head," said Chris Millar, the St Johnstone midfielder who was at the club when Connolly arrived on loan. "In our dressing room you need to work hard. Maybe his attitude wasn't as good as it should have been. He maybe thought 'I'm better than this.' Fair play to him though. He's refocused and now he's really flying with Kilmarnock. That says a lot."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article