May and Wright can bring more attacking threat to Saints’ play

St Johnstone manager Tommy Wright is confident that the return of Drey Wright and Stevie May will see his team turn possession into goals.

The Perth side toiled to break down Kilmarnock on Saturday after the visitors decided to sit in and protect their one-goal lead.

But the recent signing from Aberdeen and the winger, who was Saints’ best player before his serious knee injury, showed when they came off the bench that they will be potent attacking threats after the international break.

“What annoyed me about Saturday’s performance was it was down a bit from the week before, even though it couldn’t be described as bad,” said Wright.

“I said after the Hibs game that, with a young squad, it’s going to be an up and down season. I didn’t mean it would be up and down from one week to the next, mind you.

“We have to find a level of consistency and be a bit better at the top end of the pitch.

“Stevie May and Drey Wright will help with that.

“We’ve got to look at the number of times we got behind Kilmarnock, which was good, but the final ball wasn’t good enough until Drey came on at right-back.

“Drey will play a bounce game next week. He’ll be raring to go come Aberdeen.”

Hard work on the training ground will hopefully see Saints eradicate the sort of errors that led to Killie’s winning goal, according to Wright.

“On Saturday we were punished for making the biggest mistake of the game,” he reflected.

“In fact, there was more than one mistake in the build-up to their goal. It was calamitous defending.

“We just have to work hard in training, concentrate more and make better decisions.”

Wright added: “It’s early days but we need to start picking up points. It’s clearly not the start we would have wanted.

“But after the Celtic game we got a good point against Livi, who are flying, after being two goals down.

“Against Hibs we did really well and don’t tell me that a point there isn’t a good one.

“Then on Saturday we’ve not got a refereeing decision and we haven’t been as good as we can be.

“There’s room for improvement, I know that.

“I know everybody will be writing us off for the next two games – Aberdeen and Rangers.

“They’ll be saying it will be two points after six games.”

Meanwhile forward David McMillan has left Saints to join Falkirk on a season-long loan.

Stevie May has returned to McDiarmid Park and been tipped to help Saints hit the goal trail.