The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Davidson ‘excited’ by what Vertainen will bring to St Johnstone
Eetu Vertainen has already got St Johnstone manager Callum Davidson “excited” about what he could bring to the Perth side.
And the McDiarmid Park boss is confident that integrating the Finnish striker into his starting line-up will be a far slicker process than with Guy Melamed a year ago.
The former Ilves forward got a run-out in Monday night’s bounce game against Brechin City and thoughts now turn to whether he is ready to be included in the match day squad for tomorrow’s clash with Rangers.
“He has had a bit of a close season after isolating and training by himself,” said Davidson.
“He only trained once with us before the game with Brechin.
“But you can see he is a big, strong lad with great feet and an eye for a goal.
“I’m pretty excited about him and hopefully we can get him on the pitch as soon as possible.
“I certainly hope we can get him up to speed quicker than Guy.
“He has been working hard on his own and he played games in Finland before coming here so we will probably accelerate him.
“With all the injuries we have got, it’s actually one area of the team where we are quite strong just now. I can probably pick from all my attacking players.”
Davidson brought in two Scots before the transfer window closed and two players who are new to the Scottish game.
“With Cammy (MacPherson) and Ali (Crawford) they know how the club is run,” he said.
“Lars (Dendoncker) and Eetu might take a little longer to realise what we are all about and what Scottish football is all about. It can be frenetic, played at a real high tempo, and they will have to adapt to that.”