Graham Cummins: St Pat’s are no longer a soft touch — they are contenders

St Patrick's Athletic's Mattie Smith celebrates scoring a goal against Finn Harps with teammates. Picture: INPHO/Evan Logan

I’ve always considered St Patrick’s Athletic to be soft. A side that played some nice football but as an opposition player, you always knew that if you weathered the storm, Pat’s would eventually crumble. I thought they were pretenders. They would spend a vast amount of money on recruiting big-name players, which gathered hype and excitement around the club. But invariably their season would be over by July and they were never in the mix when it came to the latter stages of the FAI Cup or contesting for the league.

Pat’s have been one of the bigger spenders in the league in recent years but since 2016 their highest finish has been fifth. In 2018, they finished 37 points off champions Dundalk, in 2019 it was 34 points, and even with only 18 games last year, Pat’s still managed to finish 27 points behind Shamrock Rovers.