The relationship between destiny and cup competitions is one that the St Johnstone players are very familiar with.
Two years ago May 17 seemed to be written in the stars.
So when a goalkeeper sends you out of the Scottish Cup with an injury-time triple save that needed to be seen to be believed sometimes you just have to say, as Dave Mackay did on Saturday evening, “maybe it just wasn’t meant to be”.
There were wounds that were self-inflicted in the 1-0 defeat to Kilmarnock chiefly a disjointed first half that left them chasing the game.
But the stand-out moment of the tie was Jamie MacDonald denying first John Sutton, then Mackay, then Graham Cummins from close range.
“Towards the end we had some great chances,” Mackay said.
“I think Jamie MacDonald will say that he didn’t know too much about his triple save.
“Sutty’s had the first, then me and Graham’s had the third. I think it was probably the best of the three saves.
“He’s thrown himself and it’s caught his foot as Graham’s tried to go back across him.
“Sometimes you get a bit of luck, and maybe they earned it.
“It just wasn’t meant to be.
“You never know – Killie might go on a fantastic run and win it now.
“Whether we were good enough to get through to the next round, I don’t know.
“We should probably have got a replay on the balance of chances.”
Mackay believes that failing to adapt to the heavy underfoot conditions explained their poor first half display.
Killie, who scored through a Craig Slater free-kick into the top corner after just six minutes, were more precise with their link-up play and merited their half-time lead.
In a bombardment of the visitors’ goal in the last half hour, though, David Wotherspoon, Sutton and Murray Davidson all came close to scoring. And that’s without mentioning MacDonald’s intervention that the keeper admitted was “as good as it gets”.
Mackay said: “First half we were poor.
“They scored early on and played to their strengths.
“We maybe played a bit too much at times when it just wasn’t on.
“We went more direct towards the end with Graham and John Sutty coming on and we got a few chances off it.
“It’s not the fault of the groundsman but because of the horrendous weather we’ve had, parts of the pitch are like a swamp. It’s so soft.
“For the rest of the season the first goal is going to be crucial playing out there. There won’t be much great football or as many chances created as there were earlier in the season.”
The goals have dried up for Saints. That was their fourth match in a row without scoring.
But Mackay is confident that a corner will soon be turned.
“Everything we hit earlier in the season seemed to go in,” he said.
“We’re still creating chances. We’re getting a bit of bad luck and there’s been poor finishing at times maybe.
“But that will change I’m sure.”
Manager Tommy Wright felt Saturday’s cup defeat was a similar story to recent league ones.
“In the last 20 minutes we had all that chances that we needed to not only draw the game but even win it,” he said.
“It’s been the pattern of our games recently that we’ve had more chances than in our previous matches and ended up with very few points and out of the cup.
“With cup games it’s hard to pick anything good out of it when you lose.
“Yes, we’re disappointed but we’ll dust ourselves down and get going again on Monday.”
Meanwhile, MacDonald confirmed Mackay’s suspicion that there was a bit of good fortune mixed in with his goalkeeping skill.
“That is my first triple save ever,” he said. “I was just laughing after the full-time whistle.
“I don’t know how I did it. All three just hit me. I just threw myself and tried to make myself big as possible.
“As a keeper you never give up and you try to react as quickly as you can. Sometimes they go for you and sometimes they don’t. Thankfully I got a stroke of luck his week.
“Maybe we got away with it a little bit at the end but it was a big result for us.
“In the game I thought we defended really well. St Johnstone are flying this season and they’re a very good team.”