Relieved Callum Davidson kept St Johnstone in the top flight with a thumping win over Inverness Caley Thistle.
And the McDiarmid boss claimed keeping the Perth side in the Premiership was BIGGER than last season’s domestic cup double.
He praised his St Johnstone stars for showing the biggest test of character to dig themselves out of their rut and keep their side in the Premiership.
It went down to the last game but four second goals were enough to flatten Inverness and keep the Saints in the top-flight.
The Saints won the Betfred and Scottish Cups last season but Davidson reckons survival was a bigger challenge.
Davidson stated: “For me this was harder, a lot harder to achieve. It was a test of character, it was a test of how we went about our business day to day.
“How do we build confidence, how do we get players out of this rut? This was even tougher.
“It was a bigger achievement today. I don’t normally celebrate goals too much but you saw the emotion in me there.”
The tie was still level at half-time and Davidson stated his players had been garbage in the first half before they came good.
He said: "t is a relief. It’s been a hard, hard graft since November. We struggled, then we got players in, we fought, we battled.
“Some of the performances weren’t good. But we got there in the end and we’re still in the Premiership.
“All credit to the players. The supporters were absolutely fantastic tonight and I’m just glad we put a show on in the second half.
“First half we were garbage. I can’t repeat what I said at half time. I thought we’d played it too slowly in the first half and we were too obvious and too slow with the balls played forward.
“We had to be quicker and set a tempo in the second half. Goals changed games…and it changed it for us tonight.
“Confidence has been difficult. As well as we played well Friday night, we felt we should’ve been two or three goals up. It was a job of lifting them.”
Davidson will hold contract talks with his out-of-contract players like Shaun Rooney, Zander Clark, Murray Davidson and Callum Hendry.
He confirmed: ”It’s great. I’ve been thinking in my head ‘what happens if we go down, what happens if we stay up.’
“Now it’s going to be a nice conversation. I think as a club we have to understand where we are.
"We’ve started the last three or four seasons poorly – now we really have to start the season to give us a chance."
