PROMOTING assistant managers to the top job has hardly been the most rewarding of strategies for Scottish clubs of late but Gary Locke could be the man to buck that trend.
Tommy Craig lasted just a few short months at St Mirren after stepping up to fill Danny Lennon's shoes, while there has been little joy for Kenny McDowall at Rangers after succeeding Ally McCoist. Despite those high-profile struggles, Kilmarnock chose to look in-house when it came to replacing Allan Johnston as manager and elected to give Locke his chance to move up from No. 2. So far it is going fairly well. An opening draw away to Hamilton Academical earned him a shot at the job until the summer and he followed that with a 3-2 victory over Dundee United on Saturday, a first home win of the year for Kilmarnock.
Locke could not have been more deferential to Johnston in his post-match victory speech - dedicating the victory to his departed friend - but it seems some small changes the former Hearts manager has implemented are already beginning to bear fruit. There was certainly plenty to admire in Kilmarnock's second-half play that brought first an equaliser from Chris Johnston and then an injury-time winner from Sammy Clingan, a result that restored optimism around Rugby Park that a top-six finish is not beyond them.
"When the manager was assistant here he was a great laugh and he's easy to talk to and easy to get on with," revealed Johnston. "He has given us all a boost, telling us just to go out and believe in ourselves, especially the wingers. He told us to go and make things happen. He'd rather see me getting to the bye line and put in five or six bad crosses than just go backwards. It's great to know if I make mistakes I can just get on with it because he believes in me a lot.
"I think everybody would like to see him get the job. You could see with the second half performance how hard we worked, even to the last seconds when we got the goal. Everybody is behind him and we know we are the ones who are going to get him the job if we win games. We know it's in our hands."
Johnston's goal that made the score 2-2 was a curious one. The winger barely seemed to get enough contact on the ball but it still somehow found a way past Radoslaw Cierzniak in the United goal. "I was like, did that actually go in the net? Yes, I was surprised but I'll take it. I don't know what happened. I just toe-poked it towards goal and it ended up in the net. But the gaffer has told us just to get in the box and you never know what can happen, it could end up in the net, which it did."
In contrast, it was a very frustrating afternoon for Dundee United. Ahead early through Nadir Ciftci's penalty and again through Henri Anier after Josh Magennis had drawn Kilmarnock level for the first time in the match, they dropped increasingly deeper the longer the second half wore on, allowing their hosts back into the game.
The end result was a first defeat since the end of December, something that took the shine off Anier's first goal for the club. "Obviously I am happy to get a goal but I'm very sad that the result wasn't there," said the Estonian "It was definitely a hard one to take. In the first half we showed a great bit of football. There were moments when we looked full of energy but everybody knows we were really poor in the second half. It just can't happen the next time that we play so well in the first half and then drop the level in the second half. Everybody knows we have to just look to the next game."
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