Blair Spittal wants Saturday’s wonderful free-kick strike to signal a new beginning for him at Ross County.
The ex-Queen’s Park, Dundee United and Partick Thistle midfielder, pictured right, admits he hasn’t made the greatest of starts to his Dingwall career since arriving from the Jags in the summer.
Against St Johnstone, though, the 23-year-old swirled home an exquisite dead-ball finish to peg the score at 2-2 amid a difficult 90 minutes against St Johnstone. It was only Spittal’s third Premiership start – and first league goal – since making his league debut in the 4-1 defeat at home to Livingston.
He said: “I wasn’t happy with how I was playing up until then, but hopefully it can give me the confidence moving forward.
“Getting goals is something I want to add, while making sure us midfielders are getting up in support of Billy Mckay.
“In the first half against St Johnstone, Billy was very isolated while St Johnstone, when they were on the ball, were right on top of us. In the second half, we showed a good reaction to going 2-1 down.
“A lot of teams would have crumbled but we stuck to the gameplan and came away with a point.”
Co-boss Stuart Kettlewell said after the game that dead ball ability was one of the reasons Spittal was signed in the summer.
Spittal said: “I’ve scored a few in the past. Hopefully there will be more opportunities to do that with County.
“I am trying to get a good run in the team and get back to what I was doing in pre-season. The boys have been playing brilliantly, but hopefully I can get a good run in the team.”
Kettlewell was enraged by two big refereeing decisions that went against County. After Joe Chalmers’s opener, Tom Grivosti’s alleged offence gave Stevie May a chance from the spot for his first St Johnstone goal, but the penalty was saved by keeper Ross Laidlaw.
May did score before the break, but it was Saints’ second of the day from Matthew Kennedy that provoked the strongest dissent from County’s managerial team.
Moments before Kennedy’s tremendous strike from distance, Kettlewell felt Murray Davidson had planted studs on Mckay’s torso. Spittal, though, focused mainly on where County fell short.
He said: “I thought we got off to the best possible start, although you could say it was against the run of play. We get the goal and you think we would control it from there on in, but it wasn’t to be. We let St Johnstone back in the game with a few mistakes. Overall, it is probably a good point.
“We showed guts and desire to come back. It is just a bit frustrating because it was an opportunity for us to build on the last three results. But it keeps the positive momentum going into the international break.”