Striker Sutton has started the last three games for Motherwell

Motherwell's John Sutton thinks Kris Boyd will still be vying with Scott McDonald for player of the year despite his fellow striker's troubles at Ibrox.

Boyd found himself on the bench at the weekend and had a disagreement with manager Walter Smith as a result.

But Sutton said: "If you look at Celtic, Scott McDonald has had another very good season.

"But Kris Boyd at Rangers has scored an extraordinary amount of goals again and those two would be in contention."

Sutton says it will be a difficult decision this season because uncharacteristic dropped points by Celtic and Rangers have meant the lead in the Scottish Premier League has swung between the two Glasgow rivals.

But the Englishman admits that his bias towards strikers means he is leaning towards McDonald or Boyd.

And he hopes that he has done enough after starting the last three games to retain his own place in the Motherwell side for Saturday's visit by Dundee United.

"When you are not playing, it is frustrating as you want to be playing every week," said Sutton.

"But the way it is with the squads that most clubs have nowadays, that's not always going to be possible.

"Hopefully I can continue playing well as there are plenty of strikers at the club.

"But, between us, we are hoping to score enough goals to push us into fourth place and keep winning games."

Sutton was, however, not expecting a repeat of the drubbing handed to United in their last meeting in January.

"We played exceptionally well that day and deserved our 4-0 victory," he said.

"Our finishing was excellent, but Dundee United will look at the game and think they did not do too much wrong."

Sutton has not ruled out catching third-top Hearts, despite the Edinburgh club's 12-point advantage, "if you go on an exceptional run of form".

Even so, he admitted: "Fourth place gets you the chance to get into Europe this year, so that's what we're aiming for."

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