Premiership survival predictions as squeaky bum time specialist has gut feeling how it will end

The great Sir Alex Ferguson had top-of-the-table matters in mind when he came up with his famous ‘squeaky bum time’ tag to describe the pressurised final weeks of a title scrap.

But it’s at the foot of the Premiership that derrieres will be flapping as this year’s fight for survival looks set to go to the wire. St Johnstone may have planted one foot on safe land after opening up a five-point cushion but between the trailing trio of Dundee United, Kilmarnock and Ross County, the race to rescue themselves from the dropzone could barely be tighter.

A single point is all that separates the three clubs as they head into the final four games of a thrilling relegation battle. Former Hamilton midfielder and current Morton boss Dougie Imrie knows exactly how the players and managers of each club will be feeling as they gear up for a make-or-break run in.

He was part of an Accies squad that consistently defied the odds to retain their place in Scotland’s top tier despite having the Premierships’ smallest budget, featuring in five of their astonishing seven seasons in the top flight before relegation finally came in 2021.

He moved into management 18 months ago with the Ton and has now twice succeeded in steering his Cappielow squad away from danger despite again having less cash to spend than all his Championship rivals. So Record Sport thought there would be no-one better to gauge the survival prospects of the four sides desperately clutching for a Premiership lifeline.

Imrie said: “At Hamilton, we had players who were warriors, guys like Darian MacKinnon, Greg Docherty, Ali Crawford and Grant Gillespie who would play through pain and injury to ensure we got the points that kept us up.

“Of course it was difficult because with the