IT was always going to be hard for St Johnstone to top their achievement of a historic cup double last season.
But now the Perth outfit are just 90 minutes away from a spot in the lucrative group stages of the Uefa Europa Conference League after they battled to a 1-1 draw against LASK in Austria tonight.
Callum Davidson’s team would receive a windfall of €2,940,000 (£2.5million) if they were to make it into Europe’s third tier competition and they would also pick up €500,000 (£425,000) for every win, with a draw earning teams €166,000 (£140,000).
The financial gain of European football would be huge for a club of St Johnstone’s size and Davidson knows it would be another special achievement to tick off his managerial bucket list.
Speaking at full-time in Austria the Saints boss said: “I’m delighted. For St Johnstone to come away slightly disappointed with a draw shows the expectations around the performance.
“If you told me we would go away to LASK, with their European pedigree, and get a draw to take back to McDiarmid Park and give ourselves a chance to qualify I would have taken it.
“They’ve not outperformed my expectations. I know what they can do, I know what they can achieve. They follow the game plan and they were brilliant. Their work rate was unbelievable.
“They are a really good team. It’s like Galatasaray, we got the draw over there, but we won’t underestimate them. They are a top side and we will go with the same game plan and a few tweaks next week.
“To qualify for this league is probably as big a game financially as St Johnstone have had in their history. It’s an enormous game.
“It’s probably up a notch from the Galatasaray game last week. It’s a 90-minute game to get European football until December. We are talking about St Johnstone here. If we manage to do that it’s phenomenal.
“The people of Perth have missed out on two cup finals last season, and this is a cup final for us on Thursday. It’s the biggest game we have had since May 22.”
Saints took the lead through a well worked goal on 17 minutes. Michael O’Halloran used his pace to get in behind before setting up attacking teammate Glenn Middleton in the final third.
The Rangers loanee produced a pinpoint ball across the face of the goalkeeper for striker Chris Kane, who dispatched into the back of the net at full stretch.
Davidson’s team had chances to double their lead through Ali McCann, Middleton, and Murray Davidson, but they ultimately were hauled back on level terms on the hour mark.
The usually solid Jamie McCart uncharacteristically lunged in for a tackle on the impressive Thomas Goiginger and referee Glenn Nyberg pointed straight to the spot.
Zander Clark produced a couple of fine saves earlier in the match, but he had no chance with Mamoudou Karamoko’s low driven penalty.
McCart atoned for his earlier error with a last-ditch clearance on 90 minutes after a glanced header by Keito Nakamura collided with the upright.
Davidson continued: “We were disappointed when Michael had a great run and slid the ball into Glenn. He’s probably the person on the pitch I expected to score then two minutes later we concede the penalty.
“So I was a bit disappointed by that. But we hung in. Overall, I was very pleased with the performance of the players.
“We are a decent team. We can perform consistently against big teams. They know what they are doing, we are making chances and conceding few chances.
“I believe in them and they believe in themselves. They were disappointed in the dressing room at conceding the penalty but that sums up their mindset.”
Saints now have a Tayside derby to look forward to on Sunday with Dundee United visiting McDiarmid Park in the Scottish Premiership.
The Perth outfit are without a win in 90 minutes since their Scottish Cup final victory over Hibernian, but Davidson would love for that to change this weekend.
He added: “It’s big game. We need to refocus. We need to recover tomorrow and prepare properly on Saturday. Myself, Alec Cleland and Steven MacLean will be watching all their games and watching what we need to do and making sure that we have the same energy levels on Sunday.
“Not holding onto leads is something I’m a little disappointed with. Today and the Motherwell game, we’ve had leads. We need to get better. When we get in front we need to be a little bit better at seeing the game out.
“I’ll probably have to make a couple of changes. There are a few boys carrying knocks. They played through them today. I need to make sure they’re OK. I’d love to play them all but I need to make sure I’m looking after them.”
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