Deserved honour for Perth legend

Saints captain admits cup winner Mackay is a hard act to follow

Testimonials may be dying out in professional football – but not at St Johnstone.

Recently retired club captain Dave Mackay is following on from fellow Scottish Cup hero Steven Anderson in receiving a benefit year.

And the fact that there could be others to follow helps explain why the Perth side have been so successful in the last decade, according to the current Saints skipper.

“It just shows you that the nucleus of this team has stayed together for a while,” said Anderson. “That’s why we’ve done well.

“With the likes of Midge (Chris Millar) and Muzz (Murray Davidson), there could be a few testimonials to come.”

The first event to be announced for Mackay is a golf day at Blairgowrie Golf Club on May 22.

Anderson is in no doubt that the now Stirling Albion boss, whose career was cut short by a serious hip injury at the age of 35 and after 267 games for Saints, deserves the honour.

“He’s been a hard act to follow as captain, that’s for sure,” he said. “You can’t do much better than win the first Scottish Cup for the club in its history. “Dave is a club legend. “It isn’t just the Scottish Cup. His consistency over a number of years and all the games he played have to be taken into account as well.

“He’s got good times ahead with the testimonial.

“Hopefully the committee do well for him and the fans turn out. He deserves it.”

Anderson added: “Dave led by example and he was vocal in the changing room when he needed to be. Everybody respected him.

“The fact that he was a quality player certainly helped.

“He was always a seven or eight out of 10 – Del, Steve Lomas and the gaffer have all said that.

“It didn’t matter what position he played.

“I can remember playing against him when he was at Livingston. He played left-back that day and scored.

“You get used to playing beside him so it took a bit of adjusting to when he left. As a centre-back you didn’t need to worry about where he would be positional-wise.”

Saints travel to Dingwall tomorrow, with securing top six football the shortterm goal.

“It’s another big game for us after the disappointment of going out of the cup on Saturday,” he said.

“We need to keep the cushion between ourselves and the teams below us.

“I know there’s a wee gap now but we want to extend it and make sure we’re in the top six.

“Other people might think we’re there but we can’t afford to think like that. You never know what could happen if we went on a bad run.

“Six years in the top six would be a great achievement, considering our budget.

“And we were close to dropping into the Second Division when I came here.

“I think we were second bottom at one point. There was a real threat that it could happen. Thankfully we went on a run that kept us up.

“From then it’s been a steady progression and you just need to look at the managers we’ve had and how they’ve got moves to other clubs or are being linked with clubs, like the gaffer is just now.”

Talking of which, Anderson is far from shocked that Tommy Wright’s name is being mentioned to replace Mark Warburton at Ibrox.

He said: “It’s no surprise he’s been linked with Rangers given the job he’s done here.

“Top six year after year, winning the cup and the European runs – all of that without having a big budget.

“Players like to see their manager getting linked with jobs because it shows that you’ve been doing well for him on the pitch.

“He deserves to get a crack at a big club but we obviously want him to stay.

“St Johnstone have been a stepping stone for managers in recent years.

“I thought he would have been linked to more jobs but Dundee United seemed to be the only one before and that wasn’t likely to happen because you wouldn’t have gone to Dundee United at the time with the situation they were in and the way things were going for us. It’s strange.”

Brian Wesencraft, the captain of

You can’t do much better than win the first Scottish Cup for the club. STEVEN ANDERSON