Should Motherwell bring last-action hero Tony Watt back on permanent deal?

This is an excerpt from this week's Claret and Amber Alert, a free Motherwell newsletter written by Graeme McGarry that goes out every Thursday at 6pm. To sign up, click here.

Maybe it’s because he just saved Christmas by making sure Motherwell were jolted out of their annual December death spiral.

Maybe it’s because he seems to wear his heart on his sleeve, even if it gets him in bother sometimes.

Maybe it’s because he unveiled his new pair of boots on social media recently and they were wrapped up like he got them from The Rex.

Or maybe it’s just because on his day, he’s a very good player. But for whatever reason, I really want Tony Watt to succeed at Fir Park.

Now, I’m not saying he’s earned the permanent move to Motherwell in the summer that he is on record as saying he craves just yet. Or, that if and when he sees the weekly wage on offer compared to his current (eye-popping) remuneration at Dundee United that he will be quite so keen to sign it after all.

But if he is true to his word that the penny has dropped, and that he has realised that Fir Park is the place that has brought the best form out of him on a consistent basis since he thwacked the ball past Victor Valdes all those years ago, then his goal against St Mirren at the weekend seems an opportune time to assess the merits of bringing Watt back to Motherwell permanently again.

When he joined the club on loan in the summer, the first thing he had to do was win over a sceptical, spurned fanbase who were still smarting from his move to Tannadice. Motherwell had revitalised his career, after all, and he appeared to buy into everything that the club stands for.

He was all-in with the fans, and that – coupled with his impressive performances on the pitch – meant they had taken him to their hearts as much as he appeared to have taken Motherwell into his.

That all changed when he decanted for Tayside. Historically, Dundee United are of course a bigger club than Motherwell, but given their average attendances and their existence as something of a yo-yo club in more recent years, it looked like a sideways step.

Knowing the massive jump in wages that he trousered from making the move might make his decision understandable, particularly to older fans who may have families and understand that providing the very best you can for them is your main priority.

Even still though, his conduct thereafter left a bit of a sour taste, too. He only scored one goal for United in the remainder of that season after joining in January, and it just had to be a winner against Motherwell.

But it was his celebration that night at Tannadice that was ill-advised to say the least, even though he had been on the receiving end of some pretty awful abuse from the away end all evening.

I won’t repeat the song directed incessantly at him here, except to say that when I attended the next game at Tannadice, my big pal was mightily relieved to hear his young daughter had misheard the lyrics as ‘Oh oh oh, Tony Watt’s a waffle’ when she sang the ditty on the way down the road.

It is hard to be too harsh on him for his reaction in that context, but it put Watt on the back foot to an even greater degree when he ended up crawling back to Fir Park with his tail between his legs at the start of this season.

He asked for a chance to prove to the fans he was all-in once more, and while his contributions on the pitch have been sporadic and his performance levels during his fleeting appearances have fluctuated, the one thing that cannot be questioned is his commitment.

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Watt has in fact been true to his word, got his head down, worked hard, hasn’t grumbled about his role in the squad, and now we are all starting to reap the rewards.

On paper, Motherwell have an abundance of attacking options. Even if half of them have been in the treatment room for most of the season. But Watt offers something that I don’t think anyone else in the squad does, and that is the ability to drag the team up the pitch by holding onto the ball.

He has the physicality and the nous to give his teammates time to get up in support of the attack, and while he has never been a prolific goalscorer in his career outside of that incredible six-month spell at Motherwell first time around, he can certainly finish too. If he can get even close to those levels again, he would be a tremendous asset.

Where he may be key too is in bringing out the best in Apostolos Stamatelopoulos, who has looked much more like it in these last couple of games with someone up alongside him to support him, and take the burden of wrestling with centre-backs a foot taller than him off his shoulders somewhat.

It is a real shame of course that Watt will not be able to take his place alongside Stamatelopoulos for the visit of his parent club to Fir Park on Saturday, particularly when the match offers Motherwell the opportunity to leapfrog United into fourth place.

Tawanda Maswanhise posed United problems on the counterattack at Tannadice in the 2-1 win back in late October, but I would have Moses Ebiye up there alongside Stamatelopoulos for this one to keep the shape as close to the win over St Mirren as possible.

As for Watt, there is still a lot of football to be played and still some work to be done before I would definitively say Motherwell should be pushing to make his move back to the club a permanent one.

But given his qualities, and his commitment so far, he’s definitely making a case for it.

Right, enough 'waffle' from me for another week.