Livingston manager David Martindale insists he is paying no attention to the cinch Premiership table even though it makes for pretty reading for his own team.
The Lions are fifth and will climb at least up to fourth if they win away to St Mirren on Saturday. Victory in Paisley could even elevate them to third if Hearts slip up at home to Rangers.
“I’ve not looked at that, you’ve just sprung that on me,” said Martindale, when it was pointed out that the Lions could finish the weekend in the top three.
“Honestly, I go through spells when I look at the league and spells when I don’t look at the league for four or five weeks.
“I don’t need to look at the league because everybody else is telling me, including the media. I don’t really pay too much attention to the league at this point in time. I take one game at a time.”
Although keen to finish in the top six, Martindale stressed that his main priority remains to avoid relegation.
“We have aspirations of finishing top six,” he said. “It would be incredible to hit a European spot but we’ve got to keep it in perspective.
“Our goals at the start of the season are 10th or above, but collectively we have ambitions and aspirations. Top six would be fantastic but staying in the Premiership for another year is our objective at the start of the season.”
This weekend pits two of the league’s surprise packages together, with fourth-placed St Mirren level on points with Livi after they kept up their strong start under Stephen Robinson by beating Celtic 2-0 in the last match before the international break.
“It was a surprise (that St Mirren beat Celtic) but when I watched the first 20 minutes of the game, it probably became less of a surprise,” said Martindale.
“St Mirren set up very well, Ange (Postecoglou) had made a few changes and you could tell it was going to be a difficult game for Celtic.
“Fair play to Stephen and St Mirren. They’ve got a style and identity, and it’s probably very similar to when Stephen had success at Motherwell and was getting to cup finals.
“He’s brought a bit of continuity in terms of players he knows from his time at Morecambe and Motherwell and I think he’s done a fantastic job. They look like a club that’s on the up so it’s going to be a difficult game for us.”
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 here