St Mirren

Image source, SNS

• Since beating Dundee United 3-0 in November, Falkirk have scored just two goals in seven league games, attempting 86 shots (2.3% conversion rate) and amassing an expected goals tally of 6.84 in this time.

• St Mirren have only lost one of their past 10 top-flight matches against Falkirk (W5 D4), a 2-1 defeat in April 2010.

• This is Falkirk's first top-flight away game at St Mirren since a 1-1 stalemate in December 2009; their past three visits at this level have all been drawn.

• St Mirren have kept a clean sheet in their past three home league games, last doing so four times in a row in the top flight from March to May 2008 under Gus MacPherson, a run that included a 1-0 win over Falkirk.

• Falkirk's Dylan Tait has won more fouls (51) than any other player in the Scottish Premiership this season, while he is also one of only six players to have won possession over 100 times in the competition this term (102).

St Mirren have made Allan Campbell their first January signing, but what else do they need this month?

Stephen Robinson's side claimed the Premier Sports Cup on a memorable day at Hampden in December, but have struggled for consistency in the league, sitting 10th.

Where else do the Saints need to strengthen? And who would you like to see brought in?

Let us know

St Mirren vice-chairman Jim Gillespie is a leading contender to become Rangers' new chief executive. (Sky Sports), external

Image source, SNS

Conor McMenamin has signed a one-year extension to his contract at St Mirren, keeping him at the Paisley outfit until the summer of 2027.

Having signed from Glentoran in July 2023, McMenamin has made 64 appearances for the Buddies, scoring six goal and assisting a further five.

The 30-year-old started the Premier Sports Cup final victory over Celtic in December and is keen to experience more success with the club.

"I'm delighted to sign a new contract," the Northern Irish winger said.

"We've had brilliant success here since I joined the club and signing this new deal makes me hungry for more. Hopefully we can achieve that as a collective.

"I'm really enjoying my time here. It's a great club and I'm happy to get it signed and we can focus on what's in front of us now and hopefully start winning games.

"I'm settled here and have a baby on the way so everything seemed to fit. I'm looking forward to seeing what the next year or so holds."

Manager Stephen Robinson added: "Conor is somebody that we had real high hopes for. He's had injury problems and struggled a little bit in the first season, but we know his quality.

"I think he's been excellent this season, one of our best players in the last few weeks, and we wanted to keep him at the club.

"He plays in numerous positions and he's a real character around the place, but also someone with immense talent who can influence games."

Image source, SNS

St Mirren have completed the "fantastic signing" of midfielder Allan Campbell on a deal until the end of the season.

The 27-year-old former Scotland cap has been without a club since leaving Dundee United last summer.

Campbell began his career with Motherwell - where he worked under current Saints boss Stephen Robinson - and made 160 appearances before joining Luton Town in 2021.

He helped the Hatters win promotion to the Premier League in 2023 before falling out favour and spending time on loan at Millwall and Charlton.

Manager Robinson said: "I've worked with Allan before. He's gone down to England and done very well. He's the right type of character and he's got a lot of quality.

"He hasn't played football for a little while. But on a short-term contract, we think he's a fantastic signing and will be very good around the place as well. Allan's someone with immense talent that could influence games.

"With our numbers being short in midfield, he seemed like the perfect solution and we're confident that he'll be a real asset towards the end of the season."

Campbell, whose sole Scotland appearance came in the 4-1 Nations League win over Armenia in June 2022, is relishing the reunion with Robinson at the League Cup winners.

"He was the one who gave me my real start in professional football, played me, backed me, and developed me a lot as a player," he said.

"When the opportunity came up to come back and play football under him, I thought it was a great opportunity.

"I can't wait to get back playing. I keep myself well. That's one thing I pride myself on, working hard off the pitch, so I've been keeping busy, making sure that I'm ready for when I get the chance and hopefully that'll be soon."

Andrew Christie
Fan writer

January doesn't care what you've just won. It arrives anyway, checking bodies, counting absences, and whispering that good feelings only last as long as the squad can make them.

St Mirren's sorry 2-0 defeat at Motherwell on Saturday didn't erase the memory of the League Cup, but it did make the margins feel smaller. This is a team that has earned patience in Paisley, but it's also one that currently has very little slack.

Being 10th in the league at the turn of the year is enough to tighten jaws, but context matters. The cup win has raised expectations without masking the challenges ahead. There's no panic here, just a quiet recognition: January will shape how smooth - or jagged - the next few months feel.

And availability matters. Mark O'Hara and Jonah Ayunga are both out for several weeks, and Keanu Baccus remains on the sidelines. The squad is slim and every absence is obvious. There's little room for rotation, less for experimentation, and almost none for bad luck.

Central midfield is where the strain hits hardest. O'Hara's injury robs the team of organisation and authority, and Baccus' absence removes drive from the engine room.

Alex Gogic and Killian Phillips have carried a heavy load, but the side has sometimes looked solid rather than inspiring. What's missing is invention - a player who can take the ball in tight spaces, change the angle of an attack, and give St Mirren a new tempo. That kind of addition would be transformative without needing fireworks.

Elsewhere, the needs are smaller but no less urgent. Right wing-back competition would help with the crowded fixture list, while Ayunga's tendon injury, so soon after his cup final heroics, leaves Mikael Mandron and Dan Nlundulu as the only senior attacking options.

The team is thinner up front than anyone wants and one more forward option could stop it all from wobbling.

This isn't the moment for upheaval. St Mirren don't need rescuing and they don't need wholesale change. But a few precise, clever additions could turn what is already a proud, confident squad into something even harder to play against.

Get January right, and the cup win doesn't become an "aye, but at least we…". It hangs in the here and now, shaping what this season becomes rather than just explaining how we'll talk about it in years to come.

Andrew Christie can be found at Misery Hunters, external

Manager Stephen Robinson has been speaking to the media before St Mirren's Scottish Premiership trip to Livingston on Tuesday.

Here are the key lines:

• The St Mirren boss says it's "nice" to be linked with jobs, such as the vacant Aberdeen role, but his sole focus is on his team.

• Robinson insists speculation about his future "doesn't turn my head", saying: "I've been linked with every job in Scotland, England, Ireland."

• "What you also have to remember is somebody's lost their job, which is horrible," he adds. "It's a horrible industry. It's certainly not for me to talk about anybody else's job."

• Robinson says he cannot control reports and he is "certainly not complicating the job" he has in Paisley.

• "We need to do basics well here and that's my main focus," he says.

• The former Motherwell boss concedes St Mirren "are in a relegation battle" but winning their two games in hand could put them "on the verge of the top six again".

• On what he can achieve at St Mirren after multiple top-six finishes and cup glory, he adds: "The biggest thing that has to happen in this football club is staying in this division."

• "People get carried away with what we've done and how we've done it," he says. "But that doesn't change the fact that success is to stay in this division."

Watch highlights as in-form Motherwell dispatch St Mirren in a comfortable Scottish Premiership victory.

Available in UK only

Douglas: Worst performance of the season by far. We made Motherwell look good but they did enough to beat a poor Saints side. Apart from George, everyone else played below par...well below. We could hardly string two passes together and on this form...two games in hand or not...we are not far off sliding deep into the mire.

John: Well beaten. (Pun intended). Lock the League Cup away, put the medals in the drawer and accept that we're in a relegation scrap. Livi away on Tuesday will be a battle and we don't seem to have the stomach for the fight. So disappointing, but not overly surprising. This happened back in 2013 following a cup win and it's almost as if the club has learned nothing.

James: Saints need new blood in midfield given the current long-term injuries they face in that area of the pitch plus a change up front given the overall lack of goals all season. They can't keep playing the same front men while hoping for a different outcome! Otherwise they will drop deeper into the relegation zone!

Douglas: Another game where you look back and rue your missed chances. In saying that we gifted an opening goal to 'Well and that came from really slack defensive work, which is not a Saints trait. Yes we are missing dependable players, but that is no excuse and we should be able to fill these gaps with those that step in, but the facts speak for themselves, 16 goals scored throughout the season, the lowest in the division, and that speaks volumes for where we are in the league, and the problem that needs to be addressed.

Peter: The manager described the performance very well, nobody else needs to comment on it. I actually believe that the players need to go down holding their heads when they are tackled and stay down, it seems to help other teams to get decisions. Four bookings for us and none for Motherwell was astonishing.

High-flying Motherwell sit two points behind Celtic and Rangers in the Scottish Premiership with a comfortable win against struggling St Mirren.

Read the full match report here

Have your say on the game via this link

Image source, SNS

St Mirren manager Stephen Robinson: "That's as poor a performance as we've put in all season.

"I didn't think Motherwell needed to do a whole lot to win the game. They were clinical, they defended when they needed to, we didn't. We didn't do what we're good at, we didn't have a lot of crosses into the box. We didn't do the simple things well enough and if you don't do that against an in-form team you don't deserve to win.

We need desperately to get players in, we've got three big players missing and it affects any team when you've got that level of player missing, especially ourselves.

"We didn't test them at all. We put one ball in behind them but had no end product. They allowed us to have the ball in front of them but the changes didn't really make the impact.

"You can't have 10 starting players not playing to the best of their abilities. We've got three players missing which had a big impact on that but the boys I expected to step up didn't today. We didn't deserve anything out of the game and we have to react to that very quickly because we've got another big game coming up.

"I'm not confident [on doing a lot of business in January]. It's a difficult window, you play massively over the odds. We're not anybody's first choice so you have to wait and hope. It's paramount we get players in, we're asking a lot from players who haven't played at this level. After a performance like that, we're certainly looking at all areas [of the pitch].

"We've got two games in hand but you still need to pick up the points in the games you're playing and we haven't been doing that.

"This is a huge battle now, it's a relegation battle. You can turn that round if you get a couple of wins but we need to start doing that quickly."

Image source, SNS

Motherwell add Zimbabwe attacker Tawanda Maswanhise and on-loan Celtic defender Stephen Welsh following victory over the champions.

Regan Charles-Cook will miss eight weeks with an ankle injury.

Andy Halliday, Jordan McGhee and Aston Oxborough are closing in on returns while long-term absentees Filip Stuparevic (knee), Sam Nicholson (knee) and Zach Robinson (Achilles) remain out.

St Mirren have lost Jonah Ayunga (tendon) and Mark O'Hara (ankle) for two to three months, joining Keanu Baccus (hamstring tendon) on the sidelines.

Image source, SNS

• Motherwell are unbeaten in their past six league meetings with St Mirren (W2 D4), although the past two have been drawn; these two sides last played out three successive league stalemates in August 2012.

• St Mirren have enjoyed just one win in their past eight league visits to Motherwell (D3 L4), a 1-0 victory in September 2023.

• Motherwell have failed to win their opening league fixture in each of the past five calendar years (D2 L3) since a 1-0 victory over Aberdeen in 2020.

• St Mirren have only won their first Scottish Premiership match of a calendar year once since 2019 (D2 L4), beating Dundee United 2-1 in 2022.

• St Mirren have the lowest shot conversion rate in the Scottish Premiership this season (7.1 per cent) while only Celtic (-10.1) have underperformed their xG more than the Buddies (-5.7 – 16 goals from 21.7 xG).

St Mirren have suffered a double injury blow after captain Mark O'Hara and Premier Sports Cup final hero Jonah Ayunga were both ruled out for at least two months.

Striker Ayunga - who scored twice against Celtic at Hampden - went off injured in Tuesday's defeat by Rangers, while O'Hara - who has not started a game since early November - has suffered a setback in training.

With Keanu Baccus also out with a long-term injury, the Buddies are down to the bare bones.

"Jonah's had a scan, not good news," manager Stephen Robinson said. "Jonah's going to be at least a couple of months out with a tendon injury.

"Mark O'Hara, who obviously had a foot problem, he got a kick in in the last minute of the training session before Rangers and he's going to be out the same, probably two to three months with an ankle injury.

"Keanu Baccus is obviously a longer term, two to three months as well. So big blows for us in terms of the injury front.

"Jonah was in good form as well, playing really, really well. But unfortunately, quite innocuous, he's pulled up in one of his runs at Ibrox and we had a scan very quickly. So unfortunately, when there's tendons involved in these injuries, you just can't take any chances or it ends up being surgery.

"Mark has got a couple of tears in his ankle ligaments from the incident in training as well.

"We try and make sure people step up and they've had their opportunities limited probably by the form of the people we're speaking about. So it's time for them to step up.

"They'll knock on my office door, they'll tell me they should be playing. So let's hope they do."

Robinson is keen to make January signings to boost his depleted squad and says he will have to use academy players to make up the numbers against Motherwell on Saturday.

"We're very, very low on bodies, even just to fill the bench," the Northern Irishman said. "It could be a couple of 16-year-olds in the squad – good 16-year-olds, by the way, Luke Douglas and Jack Lavery.

"But we are actively looking. We're speaking to people in the positions we're speaking about, the forward positions and midfield. But that's proven rather difficult at the moment to get people in. But we'll continue to do that and see where we can take it."

Sportscene pundits Scott Allan and Billy Dodds discuss St Mirren's performance in the 2-1 defeat against Rangers at Ibrox.

Watch the best of the action from Ibrox as Rangers - who visit Old Firm rivals Celtic on Saturday - narrowed the gap on the top two with a 2-1 win over St Mirren. (Available to UK users only)

Rangers secured their first win over St Mirren in more than a year to end 2025 within six points of Scottish Premiership leaders Hearts and within three of Celtic before Saturday's second Old Firm game of the season in the league.

Read the match report

Have your say

Image source, SNS

St Mirren boss Stephen Robinson tells BBC Scotland: "Real frustration with the two goals. We spoke about it and worked on the threat Fernandez has and we made two poor decisions for both goals.

"I didn't think Shamal had a whole lot to do and Jack Butland was man of the match. I thought we were excellent second half. Once we started believing, we dominated large parts of the game without Rangers being a major threat.

"People miss penalties. I think it's the first one Marcus has missed in his career. It isn't one person's fault. Our performance was very good second half, but we come away with nothing because we didn't do the easy bits of the game.

"We have what we have to work with. We have to be better in small moments."