KILMARNOCK manager Gary Locke insists Mark O'Hara has a big future in the game after re-signing the defender on a two-year deal.
The Scotland Under-21 cap, who became the fifth youngster person to play for the Rugby Park side after making his debut as a substitute in August 2012 at the age of 16, made 18 appearances last season.
Locke, who has set a deadline of Monday for out of contract pair Manuel Pascali and Alexei Eremenko to make a decision on their respective new offers, said: "I am really pleased to be keeping our best young talent at the club, it was a coup for us to keep him.
"He is only 19 and has a big future ahead of him. I'm sure he will kick on and do very well next season."
O'Hara, who made a memorable full debut in the October 2012 win at Celtic, said: "I am delighted to have signed on again for the club.
"My goal for 2015/16 is to firmly establish myself in the first team with the hope of helping the club achieve a top-six spot."
Kilmarnock confirmed last week that Paul Cairney, Chris Chantler, Sammy Clingan, Lee Miller, Nathan Eccleston, Dylan Pooler, Euan Smith and Mark Thomson had all been released.
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