Tommy Wright delighted as his St Johnstone players show the right sort of fight

ST JOHNSTONE boss Tommy Wright praised the reaction his depleted team showed as they secured a well-deserved Ladbrokes Premiership victory over Hearts.

The home side were without Danny Swanson and Ricky Foster following the pair’s on-field dispute at Hamilton on Saturday and the manager made three changes to his starting line-up with Clive Smith, David Wotherspoon and Steven MacLean entering the fray.

Wright explained: “Football’s all about doing the right things at the right time, and winning games, and making sure that when your opportunities come along that you take them.

“We’ve taken a good opportunity tonight and I’m a very pleased manager because it’s been a tough week for everybody at the club.”

St Johnstone have opened a five-point gap on Hearts and are now just six points behind third-placed Rangers, who Wright has in his sights.

He continued: “There’s nothing to say that if we get the right run of results that we can’t close the gap on Rangers and maybe put the pressure on them – but six points is maybe asking too much.

“If that was to happen and we were able to put pressure on Rangers, it would be a tremendous achievement.”

Wright confirmed that St Johnstone will release a statement regarding the future of Swanson and Foster within 24 hours.

Meanwhile Hearts head coach Ian Cathro confirmed Sam Nicholson was sent off for allegedly spitting at an assistant referee – but stressed that there was no malice in the winger’s behaviour.

“My understanding from Sam and from the players around the situation there was no way of being able to read that as an aggressive thing.

“We suffer twice in games with this referee. It was the same situation at Partick Thistle. I think there were some parts in that game where he was a little bit quick – but let’s leave that there.”

Cathro admitted that his team ultimately failed to impose themselves on the game but refused to give up on catching St Johnstone.

“What we lacked was threat in our attack and making sure that we were able to cause enough problems in the final third.

“It was a big match. They won the game. They go ahead of us but tomorrow we need to go ahead with the situation as it is.

“This is a moment where there’s a lot of things running and pushing against us and all that does is bring questions for all of us, and put us in a situation where you’ve got to find a little bit more inside yourself.”