St Johnstone substitute Ali Crawford struck twice in quick succession to earn his side a 2-1 comeback victory at 10-man Ross County.

The Staggies had looked the better side in the first half and took the lead in the 23rd minute through Jordan White, but the visitors grew into the game and a red card for County defender Jack Baldwin just after the hour turned the tide in their favour.

Crawford, who had replaced David Wotherspoon just before Baldwin's dismissal, drew the teams level in the 77th minute and then struck again two minutes later to ensure the points would be heading back down the A9 to McDiarmid Park.

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With it being the first match back after the winter break, there would have been every chance of the players looking rusty.

County especially, though, looked sharp from the first minute, with the pace of wingers Owura Edwards and Kazeem Olaigbe causing problems in the visiting backline.

While St Johnstone had the first shot on target through Stevie May, it was the Staggies who went ahead midway through the first half.

Yan Dhanda found a yard of space just outside the box to chip the ball into a dangerous area for White to head into the corner of the net.

Olaigbe will feel he should have made it two when he skipped past a challenge to go one-on-one with Saints goalkeeper Elliot Parish, only to send the ball wide of the mark.

St Johnstone came back into the game towards the end of the first half though, firing a warning shot to their hosts when May forced a full-stretch save out of Ross Laidlaw with a header at the back post.

The Perth side continued to build up momentum after the restart, and were the beneficiaries of a potential turning point when Baldwin was shown a straight red card for a professional foul on May in the 61st minute.

Graham Carey very nearly equalised from the resultant free-kick too, hitting the outside of Laidlaw's right-hand post.

Malky Mackay reinforced his backline by bringing on extra defenders, and for a while that would frustrate St Johnstone, but Crawford's quickfire double turned the game on its head.

First he connected perfectly with a dropping ball to volley into the back of the net, before having the attacking instinct to follow up after a Laidlaw save to score the winner.

Davidson hails St Johnstone character

St Johnstone manager Callum Davidson: "We said at half-time that we thought we could win the game. We were really disappointed to go in 1-0 down, and the game was still there for us to have a go at.

"The sending off did help, but it shows the character of the team. We did it at Hibs and now we've done it at Ross County - we've taken advantage of a situation that we were given, and I'm really pleased with that.

"This is a tough place to come and play against these guys up here, so I'm really pleased to get the points and we'll go back down the A9 happy."

Mackay: We shot ourselves in the foot

Ross County manager Malky Mackay: "We started the game fine in the second half, but we shot ourselves in the foot.

"When I look at the build up to the sending off, there are five players in our team that could have done something different, which would not have ended up with Stevie May taking it off Jack.

"That being the case, we really caused ourselves our own problems. With 15 minutes to go, they got the break of the ball in the box and they fell to Ali Crawford who scored them well. We posed our own problems with the sending off, and that changed the course of the game."

What's next?

Live SPFL

Ross County host Rangers on December 23, live on Sky Sports. Kick-off 7.30pm.

St Johnstone travel to face leaders Celtic on Christmas Eve. That match kicks off at 12.30pm.

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