Saints’ cup triumph ‘may take months to sink in’ – Kerr

ST JOHNSTONE captain Jason Kerr believes it might take months for their Betfred Cup achievement to sink in.

But the defender is fully aware of the importance of securing a top six Scottish Premiership place and will quickly shift his focus to tonight’s trip to Hamilton.

Kerr became only the second Saints skipper to lift a major trophy when the Perth side beat Livingston at Hampden on Sunday.

“A few people have said that and it doesn’t quite feel real,” the 24-year-old said.

“It’s a massive honour for me and I think it will maybe sink in a couple of months down the line. But right now it just feels so surreal.

“But I’m buzzing and really honoured that I could lift the trophy. I’m proud for the family as well, they are all really happy and had a good day.”

Kerr returned to his home in Edinburgh straight after the final while some of his team-mates travelled back to Perth on the coach.

Celebrations were restricted because of the coronavirus pandemic but Kerr insists they would have been curtailed anyway because of their league demands.

“It was hard with the Covid regulations,” Kerr said. “There’s not much celebrations you can have because you are meant to be social-distancing from everyone when you get off the pitch.

“And we have a game on Wednesday so we wanted to recover for that because we really want to push for top six. We have a good chance if we get maximum points from our final three league games.

“It was a good celebration but there was nothing too much.

“We are all focused on getting in the top six. We have a lot of ambition to do well in the league.”

Saints are six points behind sixthplaced St Mirren ahead of their game in hand tonight.

“It’s always a tough game against Hamilton, especially at their place,” said Kerr.

“They will be fighting to stay up and get as many points as they can. We are expecting a really tough game but we will be right up for it.”

Jason Kerr with the Betfred Cup.