Stephen Robinson says how hard St Mirren worked to land him as their new boss paid him a massive compliment - but says he left Morecambe with a heavy heart.
Robinson, 47, left the Shrimps to sign a two-and-a-half year deal at the Paisley club, and brings with him former Motherwell coach Diarmuid O'Carroll as assistant.
The Northern Irishman will be in the Buddies' dug-out for tomorrow's Premiership clash at Dundee, and admits it has been a 'crazy' 24 hours.
He said: "It's good to be back.
"It was something that came completely out of the blue after taking training yesterday (Monday) at Morecambe and came back to a lot of text messages.
"I met with the chairman of Morecambe and St Mirren made a great play to get me, agreed compensation, and wanted to speak to me.
"You have to take that as a massive compliment - they made their intentions very clear.
"But I didn't take the decision lightly, it was with a heavy heart that I do leave."
Robinson says outgoing Saints boss Jim Goodwin spoke to him about taking on the role, having departed for Aberdeen last week. The pair have remained in conversation since Robinson left Motherwell at the turn of last year.
He said: "When I spoke to Jim yesterday afternoon and he told me the ambitions, the set-up and training facilities it was a really exciting opportunity that was very difficult for me to turn down.
"The current squad was a bonus as well, usually you come into a football club and it's a complete rebuild when the manager leaves, but that's certainly not the case here.
"There's a lot of good players that are confident and I just need to come and tickle it along for now and put my own stamp on it as we go."
St Mirren's clash at Dens Park is a game in hand, which will put the Paisley side fourth in the table should they run out winners.
Robinson took Motherwell to two cup finals and into Europe, and hopes to replicate that success at the SMiSA Stadium. He said: "We'll certainly be trying to.
"It takes a lot of time to build things, but there's already been a lot of good stuff put in place and it's for me to continue to do that.
"First and foremost, to try to break into the top six, do that on a regular basis, and there's European football down to fourth.
"Everybody's thinking the same thing, but there's an infrastructure and a platform to do that."
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