Daniel Armstrong eyes Kilmarnock European place after Livingston victory

It was the Chinese who came up with the curse “May you live in interesting times” and, for the small but passionate band who follow the fortunes of Livingston, these are very interesting times indeed. On the surface, there would appear to be little to worry about. In 2018 the West Lothian club returned to Scottish football’s elite division after a 12-year absence and they have maintained that status for six seasons now. Yet concerns remain. In spite of surviving on the smallest budget in the Premiership, in August they posted losses of £819, 220 for their latest financial year and chairman John Ward warned that a top-six finish would be required this season if a similar outcome is to be avoided. The following month the club was taken over by Baycup Limited, a company which Companies House website reveals was incorporated on August 24 of this year. Majority shareholder John McIlvogue then took the unusual step of claiming that he had not purchased the club in order to syphon money from it.   "I had spoken to somebody about previous people coming in to the club and stripping all the assets and what not but the reality is that there are no assets to strip: there is nothing [left] to take,” he said. McIlvogue went on to describe manager Davie Martindale as, “pound-for-pound, the best manager in the SPFL”, claiming that the 49-year-old, who has been operating without a contract, merits a long-term deal. That has yet to be signed. Livingston also have 18 members of their first-team squad (11 of whom took part at Rugby Park on Saturday) who will become free agents at the end of the current campaign and that defeat saw them drop, temporarily at least, into the bottom half of the table. They are just three points ahead of Ross County in the play-off position, having played two matches more than the Highlanders. Former Rangers and Hearts midfielder Jason Holt, confessed that their display in Ayrshire was unacceptable. “In my opinion, that was the worst we’ve played all season,” said the 30-year-old. “To go one down, get ourselves back in the game and then lose another goal so quickly was a real blow but we didn’t deserve anything from the game. “I genuinely don’t know what went wrong. We were all just really flat and couldn’t seem to get a grip of the game at all. To be fair, I thought they were better than us in all areas of the park. “Losing the goals the way we did was hard to take but that was probably the most disappointing aspect. “The international break coming when it did possibly didn’t help us. We spoke before the kick-off about how this was a chance for us to win back-to-back games and give ourselves some real momentum. “We’d performed really well to beat Motherwell before the break but this was like the polar opposite of that day. “Now we need to find a way to get back to those levels against Dundee at our place on Saturday and then away to Hearts the following Wednesday.”