Ross County suffer late heartbreak against St Johnstone in Perth
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St Johnstone 1
Ross County 0
Scorer: Middleton (87)
Ross County suffered late heartbreak in Perth as Glenn Middleton fired a late winner for St Johnstone.
The result means Ross County are just one point ahead of Kilmarnock in 11th and two above bottom placed Hamilton Academical going into the split.
Ross County made one change to the team that was beat 2–1 by Hibernian going into today's match against St Johnstone with Harry Paton replace Blair Spittal in the starting 11.
After a quiet first half hour, St Johnstone started to threaten in the final 15 minutes before the break.
Chris Kane took advantage of slack defending to go clear through on goal but Ross Laidlaw did well to block his shot.
Liam Gordon leapt like a salmon out of a river of Ross County defenders to connect with David Wotherspoon's free kick from eight yards out. But his header went inches over the crossbar.
St Johnstone went close again on the stroke of half time as Shaun Rooney's cross went unchallenged to find Calum Booth but his low drive from 12 yards out was easily saved by Laidlaw.
Ross County’s first chance of the came midway through the second half when Keith Watson’s cross from the left wing found Coll Donaldson eight yards out but he blasted over the bar.
St Johnstone had a great chance to take the lead with 10 minutes remaining. Middleton beat the offside trap and was clean through on goal but fired his shot from outside the box wide of the left post.
But Saints nicked all three points at the death when Middleton latched on to Stevie May’s cross from the left wing and fired a low drive past Laidlaw to win the match.
St Johnstone - Clark, Booth (Tanser 73), Kerr, Gordon, McCart, Craig, Rooney, McCann, Kane (May 62), Wotherspoon, Melamed (Middleton 73).
Subs – Parish, Brown, Tanser, Bryson, Gilmour, Conway, O'Halloran.
Ross County – Laidlaw, Hjelde, McKay (Gardyne 62), Watson, Iacovitti, Lakin (Vigurs 62), Tillson, Naismith, Paton, Donaldson, White.
Subs –Hilton, Draper, Shaw , Hylton, Charles-Cook, Kelly, Wright.
Referee – Craig Napier
