Euan Henderson believes that Airdrie are heading in the right direction – and the Diamonds striker has league leaders St Johnstone in his sights.

The club’s top scorer grabbed his fifth goal in five games in last Friday night’s Scottish Cup match against St Mirren.

The fine finish took the televised tie to extra-time after Jacob Devaney’s first-half stunner, but with penalty kicks looming, a similarly inch-perfect strike from Roland Idowu saw the Buddies progress.

While satisfied with an excellent Airdrie display, Henderson felt his side’s efforts deserved more.

“We felt we played a good game, we just felt we came up short – but we were up against Premiership opposition and we went toe-to-toe in the game.

“I think with our actual performance we were happy, but with the result we weren’t.”

The former Hearts man’s second-half strike saw his season’s tally rise to 18, a career high for the 25-year-old.

With at least 13 matches remaining, the in-form frontman would have to be very unlucky not to add to his total.

“It’s decent. It is the best in my career. There’s still quite a few games – I’m not one to set goals but obviously I’m near the 20 mark, which would be good for an attacker.

“I take it game by game and just keep trusting what I’m doing – getting chances and trying to put them away – and personally for me, see where I end up.”

Simo Valakari’s St Johnstone come to town on Friday evening as attention switches back to the William Hill Championship, and the Diamonds will be hoping for a big improvement on their previous displays against the Perth side, who have sat atop the league table since matchday 1.

Jamie Gullan and Cheick Diabate had the Saints two ahead on their last visit to Airdrie in September, managing to see out the victory despite Cammy Cooper reducing the deficit in the second half before Diabate and Aaron Reid were needlessly sent off at the final whistle.

The Diamonds’ strongest spell came at the beginning of the return fixture at McDiarmid Park in November, but after weathering some early Airdrie chances the home side eased to a 3-0 win thanks to an Adama Sidibeh hat-trick.

Sidibeh departed the club last month, but the title hopefuls wasted no time in strengthening up-front, snapping up Queen’s Park’s top scorer Josh Fowler alongside former Spiders frontman Ruari Paton.

Henderson is aware of the strength in depth that St Johnstone possess, but insists that the Diamonds are capable of standing up to it.

“I expect two teams trying to play good football and pass the ball. They’ll stick to their principles, which we will as well.

“In defence, midfield, and attack they’ve got good players – it’ll be a tough game. We’ve just got to take confidence from the game against St Mirren, try to play as well as that or even better, and see where it takes us.

“We probably haven’t really played that well against St Johnstone this season, so it would be good for us to put down a good performance against them and get a win at home, which we’ve not had enough of.”

Bottom two Ross County and Queen’s Park face off again on Saturday, as do Raith Rovers and Greenock Morton – the two sides immediately above eighth-placed Airdrie.

A favourable set of results could be a massive boost for the Diamonds – and Euan says morale is high in the squad as they prepare for a tense final third of the campaign.

“We’ve just got to keep playing with the same intensity and freedom, and everyone expressing themselves and scoring goals – even when we go behind in games now, we’re still getting back in them.

“The team has really developed a lot from when I first came in at the start of the season, and I think everyone is really happy playing and being a part of the team. You can see what direction we’re actually going in.

“We’re all looking forward to finishing the season as strongly as possible… and hopefully get a cup win in there as well, that would be good!”

Head coach Aaron Taylor-Sinclair wants his side to give a better account of themselves than in previous meetings with the league leaders.

“These are the games you want to be involved with, live on TV again. I think in the two games we’ve played against St Johnstone we’ve probably not really turned up, so we’ve got a wee bit of a point to prove.

“They’ve got loads of threats, the two new strikers are more firepower for them so we’ll have to be on our toes.

“They can hurt you from different areas, but we so can we, so we’re looking forward to the game.”

The Diamonds boss expects no change to his injury situation, with Rhys Armstrong, Alex King, Aaron Reid and Aidan Wilson continuing to miss out, though forwards Robbie Mahon and Dom Thomas rejoin the squad after being cup-tied for last week’s fixtures against Arbroath and St Mirren.

Referee Colin Steven’s only other match featuring Airdrie this season was October’s goalless draw at Queen’s Park.

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