St Mirren ultimately achieved their primary goal of staying in the Premiership for another season, but they certainly took the scenic route to do so. Defeating Dundee United in the Premiership playoff final came after a hectic campaign that saw an early managerial change.
Alan Stubbs took over in the summer looking to make St Mirren move away from the bottom of the pack. No less than 10 players arrived in the summer in a total revamp, including flops such as Cody Cooke, Jim Kellerman, and Jeff King to name a few. Fortunately for Saints, Paul McGinn and Adam Hammill were also both signed up for the new campaign.
Stubbs' Saints side barely had any composure on the ball, and were consistently leaking defensive errors. He managed to win one of his first five games of the season, and also secured Betfred Cup group stage progression before being knocked out by Aberdeen. Saints took the swift decision to sack Stubbs for Oran Kierney. The latter, however, performed even worse with the same players before the winter break. It took Kearney nine matches to win his first one against Hearts. Just two wins in 22 matches had fans on Kearney's back, as Saints continued to struggle and at times looked doomed at the foot of the table. Being knocked out of the Scottish Cup by Championship side Dundee United at home didn't help either.
But something just seemed to click in the final three months of the season. Kearney had brought in Vaclav Hladky during the January transfer window, and his performances produced some inspired results for St Mirren. The Buddies ended the season unbeaten in eight matches, with Hladky conceding one goal or less in seven of them.
It was like a switch had been flicked by the Saints. Kyle McAllister was thriving on the responsibility, whilst Stephen McGinn and Brad Lyons were impressively becoming more influential in the midfield. Kearney's nine January signings were finally making an impact, and started clicking nicely.
Unfortunately, it was all too late to avoid the relegation playoff position, but that didn't matter. A confident display against United forced penalties, with January signing Hladky making sure none of United's four penalties got past him.
Kearney's target heading into the summer will be to bolster his squad and make sure things aren't so close at the bottom of the table next season. They now have momentum and stability, and it's all on a plate for Kearney to start progressing this fine football club.
