Marvin Bartley urges Livingston to build on victory over St Mirren

Marvin Bartley watched Livingston end their long run without a William Hill Premiership win with a 2-0 victory at St Mirren and urged them to follow it up against Aberdeen on Friday night.

An Alex Gogic own goal and a strike from Scott Pittman gave the visitors only their second league win of the season, the first coming against Falkirk in August.

Kilmarnock’s 1-0 defeat at Aberdeen means the league’s bottom side moved nine points behind Killie with four post-split fixtures remaining, while St Mirren are still only two points ahead of the Rugby Park club, who are in the relegation play-off zone.

Livi start off next weekend’s fixtures by hosting the Dons on Friday night and boss Bartley said: “We were always trying to go on a run.

“I think even when we were drawing games of football, it was like, how long can we stay unbeaten for?

“So that would be the message to the players, can we get another win, back-to-back wins?

“But the only way you get that is by working hard daily and I’m a massive, massive advocate that is the only way that this team can come out and try and perform on Friday.

“We’re not good enough to hit a switch. Not train properly in the week and then come the weekend try and turn it on against Premiership teams.

“I’m delighted for the players. I know there’s been a massive pressure on them, mentally it’s been really, really tough.

“Obviously, you only have one win which came back in August.

“You see all that and hear all the outside noise, but you know they dealt with it really, really well today and as I said, I could not be prouder of them and the staff.”

St Mirren interim coach Craig McLeish revealed the message to his players after the game.

He said: “That we have a choice. We can start moaning at each other. We can start nipping at each other.

“We can start being negative or we stick together as a group and that’s what we will do. We’ll stick together as a group, it’s my responsibility to pick them up and keep being positive with them.

“This isn’t the time you start singling out people or individuals, we need everyone.

“And it’s that message that we’re in it together, but I’m responsible for it all. I’m comfortable with that.

“We have four games to save our season rather than five. We are in survival mode.”

Jonah Ayunga will be assessed after sustaining a knee injury at the start of the second half which required a stretcher to take him away while Gogic will be suspended for two games after picking up his 12th yellow card in the league.