Livingston

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• Livingston have lost none of their last seven top-flight home games against Dundee United (W5 D2) since a 0-2 reverse in February 2005.

• Dundee United have only won one of their last eight Scottish Premiership meetings with Livingston (D3 L4), a 2-0 victory in April 2023.

• Excluding years in which they were relegated, Livingston have only won their final top-flight match of a calendar year in three of their previous 11 years (D3 L5), most recently beating Kilmarnock 2-1 to round off 2020.

• Excluding their relegation in 2023, Dundee United have won their final Scottish Premiership match of a calendar year without conceding in both of their last two such fixtures, beating Ross County 3-0 in 2022 and Aberdeen 1-0 in 2024.

• Dundee United's Jim Goodwin has only won one of his nine Scottish Premiership away games as a manager against newly promoted opposition (D3 L5), although that was a 5-1 victory over Dundee United with St. Mirren in January 2021.

Jonathan Sutherland
Sportscene presenter

Cristian Montano (Livingston): In the chaotic first eight minutes against Celtic, Montano kept his head while everyone else was losing theirs.

Seized his chances to put Livingston ahead twice against Celtic. Almost claimed his hat-trick later in the game.

Watch highlights as Celtic and Livingston share four goals in the opening 10 minutes before the visitors go on to secure victory in the Scottish Premiership. (Available to UK users only)

We asked for your views after Livingston's winless run continued with a 4-2 home defeat to Celtic.

Here's what some of you said:

Leslie: I felt Livingston actually posed a real attacking threat for the first time in a long while, where our box entries actually translated into goal-threatening chances, which is a real positive. But outside of that and the workrate, the performance was abysmal. The Celtic team looked awful defensively too, yet found themselves strolling in the second half rather than trying to fully kill the game. There has to be questions asked regarding David Martindale's position, 17 games without a win is terrible regardless of how small your budget is.

Malcolm: A lot of Livi fans seem to agree that despite the final score we played better in the second half. We played really well overall, and were unlucky not to come away with anything from the game. Celtic just got the breaks. We need a poacher in the opposition box to steal goals. Hopefully January will bring that, and then we can turn things around.

Wilfried Nancy continued to recover from his dismal start as Celtic manager, his side twice coming from behind in a ridiculous first half to beat Livingston and move to within three points of Scottish Premiership leaders Hearts.

Read the match report here

Have your say on the game via this link

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Livingston manager David Martindale: "I'm disappointed at the outcome.

"I felt we created enough in the game to get more from the game. I don't think Celtic should have had a penalty. I felt it was a push on Dan Finlayson.

"I felt we were much better in the second half. I felt we posed an attacking threat for the majority of the second half and I thought if we could have nicked that third goal it would have turned into a wee bit more of a contest.

"We changed the shape at half time and I felt we created more than enough chances in the second half to nick that third goal then you never know what could happen from there. We created some good opportunities in transition and on the counter.

"Sometimes you need a wee bit of luck. I feel you need VAR decisions going in your favour, today I felt that went against us again. It's probably a debatable one but I felt it should have gone in our favour. I think the January window is going to help us strengthen.

"I do genuinely feel that there's a lot of positives within performances. I don't think we got battered today, I thought we were competitive within the game. We need to tidy up in our own box and I think that's been our story of late. I think we need to tidy up in the offensive areas as well because goals win games."

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Livingston have paid an undisclosed fee to sign Curacao winger Joshua Zimmerman from Dutch second-tier side TOP Oss.

Zimmerman has signed a three-and-a-half year deal with David Martindale's side, who sit bottom of the Scottish Premiership, and will officially join on 1 January.

The 24-year-old, an international team-mate of Livi defender Joshua Brenet at World Cup-bound Curacao, scored seven goals in 81 appearances for Oss after moving from Belgian club OH Leuven.

He is Livi's second signing in three days, with Ghanaian midfielder Emmanuel Danso having joined earlier this week.

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Livingston defender Ryan McGowan returns from suspension while Cammy Kerr (groin), Aidan Denholm and Shane Blaney (both hamstring) and Adam Montgomery (calf) remain on the sidelines.

Celtic remain without Kelechi Iheanacho, Alistair Johnston, Callum Osmand and Marcelo Saracchi (all hamstring) along with Jota (knee) and Cameron Carter-Vickers (Achilles).

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Striker Jeremy Bokila insists one win is all Livingston need to ignite their season.

The Premiership bottom club, who host champions Celtic on Saturday, have gone 16 games without victory.

Bokila revealed the Livi camp had discussed what is required for a turnaround in form.

The 37-year-old, who has scored five goals this season, said: "We talked about like personal, individual mistakes that we're making, not checking your men, those kind of things. So it causes also a lot of points. So you start to talk about it.

"But talk is not enough. You need to also work on it and to prove it on a pitch. So that's the thing we are working hard on.

"So I think as soon you win one game, you get a little bit time and space to breathe, so you can focus on the next game.

"But we need to do more than we are showing now. That's a fact. That's what I believe because, if you win, it gives you a kind of feeling of relief, OK, we made the first step.

"And then you will see the second game will be better because you still have this confidence."

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• Livingston have lost their past nine meetings with Celtic in all competitions by an aggregate score of 26-4 since a 0-0 draw in October 2021.

• Celtic have won their past four league visits to Livingston, including their latest three without conceding; they have never before won four in a row away to the Lions without shipping a goal.

• Celtic have won 18 of their past 19 league games against newly-promoted opponents (D1), scoring 63 goals and conceding just nine in this run since a 2-1 defeat away to Hearts in July 2021.

• Livingston have lost three of their past four Scottish Premiership matches to nil (D1), as many as they had in their previous 21 combined (3).

• Celtic's Reo Hatate has created more chances from open play (26) than any other player in the Scottish Premiership this season, while only Hearts' Alexandros Kyziridis (3.9) has a higher expected assists from open play total than the Japan midfielder (3.2).

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Livingston have announced the signing of Ghanaian midfielder Emmanuel Danso from Norwegian club Stabaek.

The 25-year-old midfielder will officially join on New Year's Day after his current contract expires.

Danso has agreed a deal until the summer of 2029.

He initially moved to Europe in 2019 when he signed for Lyon and made 12 appearances for the French club's second team before spending three years in

Norway, the first two with Stroemsgodset.

He joined Stabaek for the 2025 season, making 24 appearances for the second-tier club.

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Livingston boss David Martindale is backing Celtic counterpart Wilfried Nancy to be a success in the Scottish Premiership despite a difficult start.

Nancy picked up his first win last weekend with a 3-1 victory over Aberdeen in his fifth game in charge, leaving his side six points behind leaders Hearts with a game in hand.

The Frenchman has come under fire from supporters for being unable to pick up results the way interim boss Martin O'Neill did.

But Martindale, whose side host Celtic on Saturday, has backed the new boss and the club's decision to bring him in during a really busy period.

"The manager is available, so why would you not bring them in?" the Livi boss said.

"It's all hindsight. Everybody's great with hindsight these days and social media is full of hindsight expertise.

"You had to bring Wilfried in, he's going to be the manager.

"So Wilfried comes in, a bit of a rocky start. Roma, wee bit different, the League Cup final, I think St Mirren were the better team over the course so I'm not going to say he was unlucky there because I do feel they deserved the victory.

"The Dundee United game, I think Jim [Goodwin] alluded to this himself, I think they could have been 3-0 or 4-0 down in the first half.

"And in the Aberdeen game, they've played a lot of the game against 10 men but I think they've hit the bar and the post five times in 15 minutes so I'm not really buying any of that narrative of poor Celtic, poor Wilfried.

"The plethora of players that he's got available to choose from and the longer he's going to be in the club, I think the stronger they are going to get."

Nancy immediately switched to a back three, the former Columbus Crew boss' preferred system, and the players seemed to struggle with the change early on.

But Martindale believes it's only a matter of time before things start to click.

"You bring a coach in with not really any coaching experience in Scotland and I think there's always going to be that adaptation period," he added.

"And then you probably throw in there a change of shape, it means it'll be a bit more difficult again.

"But if you're a coach and your philosophy has a certain style of play, why would you wait to implement it? Because surely the quicker you implement it the better you get at it.

"So for me, I find some of the comments I've seen on social media and some of the comments I've heard on television really extreme and really disappointing but it's the modern-day game. I am not really surprised by them."

Stuart Barrie
Fan writer

Bottom of the league at Christmas doesn't bode well for staying up this season.

I do believe have the quality and performances to turn things around, however we are running out of games to do so. Even ChatGPT was a bit stumped when I asked what teams bottom of the pile at Christmas that stayed up (it eventually came up with four).

The manager has faith, I think the player do believe too and as a fan you have also got to have faith we can stay up.

There is a bit of a split emerging between the fans on the future of the manager. It's getting a wee bit angry too. Personally, I find it appalling that fans call for people to be sacked and the press stoke that fire with negative speculation too. Fans are entitled to voice opinions but do we really think there is better out there than Davie Martindale that can do what he has done on this budget? I doubt it. Some of the names people shout for are just random and often don't make sense given they are likely out of work from having been let go for lack of success previously.

A win against Dundee United and something from the Celtic game and the fans will forget the bickering to get behind the team.

I am actually looking forward to the visit of the current champions. It's the idealist against the pragmatist.

Celtic are in transition and do look vulnerable to long, quick passes behind their defenders or to the corners. They don't look comfortable with a good old dose of getintaethem as well. We're pretty decent at both so I do think we'll get something here.

It won't be easy but if the players can keep off the turkey and focus on doing what we have been doing well, I believe we will start picking up points in this round of festive fixtures.

Sportscene pundit Neil McCann analyses Livingston's survival hopes after the 1-0 defeat to Dundee extended their winless run to 15 league games and kept them three points adrift at the bottom.

Watch highlights as St Mirren win 1-0 against Livingston in the Scottish Premiership.

We asked for your views on Livingston's 1-0 defeat against St Mirren.

Here's what some of you said:

Steven: Six wins in our last 53 top flight matches. Not a single question of the manager's position from anyone other than the fans. We are no longer Livingston, we're just David Martindale's play thing, propped up by puppets in his control.

Thomas: No idea why Robbie Muirhead doesn't get more starts, makes a difference every time he comes off the bench and was a key starter last year.

Malky: It's looking like a bleak Christmas, I don't think even Santa could deliver us a win. It's a three horse race to stay up unfortunately.

League Cup winners St Mirren kept the feelgood factor flowing this festive season after a narrow Scottish Premiership victory over Livingston gave them a third consecutive win.

Read the full match report here.

Have your say here.

Livingston manager David Martindale: "Big moment in the game, we don't defend it well enough and we lose 1-0. It's kind of been the story of the majority of the season.

"I don't think we dominated a lot of the game. We defended, for the majority, our box really well. There's one moment they get in behind us and that leads to the goal. We've underperformed in terms of the points return in comparison to performances.

"The January window, the club's going to need to go out and find players and that's something that we're actively doing. We're going to have to go out and get reinforcements to try and make sure we stay in the league."

"There's two in the building already. One's a transfer that all the paperwork's done, we wait on the window opening, one's a pre-contract already to go on 1 January. Those two will help but there's probably going to be another three or four we're looking to bring in."

Image source, SNS

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St Mirren have lost Keana Baccus to a long-term hamstring tendon injury but captain Mark O'Hara is closing in on a return from a foot problem.

Malik Dijksteel sat out last weekend's League Cup final with a fitness issue.

Livingston defender Ryan McGowan is suspended while Cammy Kerr (groin), Aidan Denholm and Shane Blaney (both hamstring) and Adam Montgomery (calf) remain on the sidelines.

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Livingston manager David Martindale believes St Mirren's League Cup triumph was "just rewards" for the way they have been run over many years.

The sides go head-to-head in Paisley on Saturday with Livingston bottom of the Premiership and desperate for a first win since August.

In contrast, St Mirren are still on a high after beating Wilfried Nancy's Celtic 3-1 at Hampden on Sunday, their first major trophy in 12 years.

Despite that, Martindale is confident his side can come away with something if they play to their full potential.

"I've got a lot of respect for [Stephen Robison] and what he's done at the club," Martindale said.

"Very, very well-run football club that are getting their just rewards for that continuity they've kept in the building, style of play, how they want to play, their manager, their players they've recruited every window, they enhance their club.

"There's a lot to be said about how St Mirren run their football club and how Robbo and his staff manage that group of players.

"It was well deserved [winning the League Cup]. Going to Paisley is a difficult game of football on the back of anything, win, lose or draw. I know it's going to be a difficult game on Saturday.

"I don't think any team goes and enjoys going to play football in Paisley and that's testament to Robbo and his staff.

"It's going to be a difficult game but I think it's definitely one we can get something from. But you need to work extremely hard if you're going to get anything from the game from a really tough St Mirren team who have had a lot of success in recent years."

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• Fresh from his brace in St Mirren's League Cup final win over Celtic, Jonah Ayunga has three goals in his past three appearances in all competitions – just one fewer than his previous 42 beforehand (four). Ayunga has never found the net in back-to-back matches for the club before.

• St Mirren are unbeaten in nine Scottish Premiership games at home to Livingston (W5 D4) since a 2-0 defeat in August 2018.

• After their 1-0 win in February 2024, Livingston could secure back-to-back Premiership wins over St Mirren for the first time since December 2018.

• After their 2-0 win over Dundee United, St Mirren could rack up successive home league victories for just the second time since the start of last season, previously doing so in March/April 2025.

• Livingston have just one win in their 16 league games this season (D6 L9), the fewest by any side in their opening 16 matches of a Scottish top-flight campaign since Gretna in 2007-08 (also one).