When St Johnstone won a penalty that had the potential to secure them victory over Kilmarnock, Craig Levein’s first instincts were that Graham Carey should be the man to take it.
But after it became clear that Benji Kimpioka had stepped up for the spot-kick, the Perth boss admitted that his own effort to take the responsibility off the club’s top scorer were “pretty feeble”.
Levein is delighted to see that the Swedish international’s confidence is sky high.
And grabbing the ball after Lewis Mayo tripped him in the Rugby Park box was the proof of it.
“To put a team move like that together you need to be playing with confidence as a team,” said Levein, reflecting on the slick exchange of passes in the build-up to Kimpioka being fouled with around 10 minutes left in the Premiership contest.
“Benji obviously finished it off with the penalty but what he did in the box at the end of the move was really good.
“He wouldn’t have been doing that if his confidence wasn’t high from scoring a few goals.
“He wouldn’t have taken the penalty at the tail end of last season.
“We were trying to get the message on that Graham should have been taking it but I was also thinking to myself: ‘He’s in good form and he’s feeling confident’.
“It was pretty feeble attempt to try and stop him, to be honest!
“I like to see him being confident.
“Graham was good in that situation. The worst thing you can have is a fight over who is taking it.
“Benji scored so there was nothing else to be said other than ‘well done’.”
More to come
Levein added: “The point I’m making is that all the good stuff he’d been doing had got him to the position that he was grabbing the ball to take the penalty.
“I do think there’s more to come from him.
“He’s playing every week and trying new things all the time – in training and in games.
“I don’t want to stop any of that stuff. It’s a case of just carry on and continue what you’re doing.”
Levein revealed that Kimpioka had put in so much effort before pre-season started that he needed to bulk up a bit.
“He’d been working really hard in the close-season so, if anything, he was too thin when he came back,” said the McDiarmid Park boss.
“There’s not a pick on him.
“He’ll benefit from that hard work but we needed to make sure he had enough energy.
“It wasn’t a case of him not eating properly or anything like that, he’d just lost weight because he’d been working so hard.
“I’m really pleased for him just now.
“It’s amazing how much a proper pre-season can improve someone.”
Meanwhile, David Keltjens and Andre Raymond are injury doubts for Saturday’s clash with Rangers but both have a chance of playing.
“David is better but didn’t train today,” Levein reported.
“Andre didn’t train either. He got a knock on his ankle.
“They’ll both be desperate to play at Hampden.
Conversation