ONE of those rare 'stop the clocks, freeze the moment' weekends has arrived for St Mirren supporters. The Paisley club's faithful can rise from their slumber today and bask in the fact that, yes, a fortnight after sinking to bottom of the Scottish Pr
emier League their team really has just gone eighth by winning back-to-back league games for the first time this season; really has just scored twice in a home win after eight previous encounters at their old ground this season had yielded a mere three goals for the league's lowest scorers.
And adding further satisfaction to a rapid league ascent, as if further were needed, Gus MacPherson's side overwhelmed sorry Highland opponents with the sort of slick, enterprising football that the St Mirren manager and his players have often insisted has gone unrewarded this season.
That never seemed in danger of happening against Inverness, was never in doubt from the point, 16 minutes in, when Dennis Wyness knocked the ball into the path of Andy Dorman as he steamed through the inside left channel.
What happened next was a microcosm of the entire afternoon's events. Even when all of 25 yards from goal, and with Phil McGuire on his tail, Dorman's run had goal written all over it. In such composed and confident fashion did the midfielder power forward, it was as if in his mind he completed the action of flicking the ball with the outside of his right boot wide of keeper Ryan Esson before his body carried out the action to perfection. When 26 seconds into the second half Garry Brady slammed in a whipping in cross from Jim Hamilton that begged to be hit, St Mirren switched into finesse-framed attacking mode. No wonder the cheers from the home supporters at the end were so voluble it was as if their 3,000 home fans were a theatre crowd demanding another curtain call.
St Mirren front two Wyness and Hamilton pulled the visitors' backline this way and that. Wyness, against his old club and befitting a player who had netted for the first time in 14 months the previous Saturday, looked as if he had been supping on belief in the week since. It was intoxicating for the team around him and those watching them.
MacPherson, however, remained strangely sober in his assessment. "We deserved to win and it was pleasing to get a clean sheet." He wouldn't even agree that the display topped any at Love Street this season. "We played very well against Dundee United but didn't take our opportunities," he countered.
Dorman's goal was his first in the league since April and his manager declared him "more like himself". "He is certainly a threat from the middle of the park. Once he gets into those areas he has great composure. We had to explain to him that a lot of his game is based on fitness, his forward runs, but he's missed a considerable amount of pre-season work and he's only going to get his fitness through the matches and he certainly looked back to his best today."
The interest in the final, final days of the rickety but resonating-in-history Love Street, or St Mirren Park, assumed an international dimension yesterday. A group of Mechelen supporters travelled over from Belgium for the third-last game to be staged at the ground, revisiting a place they had watched their team play a Cup Winners' Cup tie at 21 years ago.
Sad to reflect that the chances of the new St Mirren Park ever playing host to so grandiose an occasion as a European tie appear about as likely as a Scottish bank ever again being a major player on the world financial stage. Merely ensuring that top-flight football is a constant feature at the new home is likely to be the Paisley club's only real concern for the next 21 years.
By the time their flit to Ferguslie Park comes around in the first week of January, current evidence suggests that they might be well have put some daylight between themselves and whoever could be saying ta-ta to the SPL in May. And judging by their superiority over Craig Brewster's side, their Highland opponents could join Hamilton in fearing farewells from the game's upper strata. How Inverness have taken as many points on the road as any team outside of the Old Firm was difficult to figure in watching their feckless efforts in Paisley. One drive across goal was about it for their notable attempts. And, in fairness, Brewster made no attempt to gloss over his team's failings.
"We were second best today," he offered gloomily. "St Mirren scored goals at the right times and that killed us. On the park when you are not 100% up for it, it spreads through the whole team. Standing on the touchline, you think 'who can you change' but I could have changed umpteen today. We didn't look like scoring and that's a worry. You need to score goals to win games." St Mirren know all about how that works… from the upside, for a change.
