DAVID Hopkin could be handed an early Christmas present as the Tele understands that Jack Baird is set to extend his loan deal past January.

The St Mirren loanee has become a firm fans’ favourite since his deadline day switch from Paisley and has previously admitted that he was unsure of his future beyond January. 

But the Tele understands that he is set to stay with Ton after weeks of speculation.

It will come as welcome news to Ton fans after a number of impressive performances and three goals for the 23-year-old.

The centre-half believes that the Ton have built a platform after Saturday’s 2-0 victory at Alloa to go on a run that will see them progress back up the table as he looks to turn the season around.

He told the Tele: “I’m delighted to get the monkey off the back. I had the same problem at St Mirren a few seasons ago where we couldn’t win at home. 

“No matter what way you look at it, we needed a good result, so I’m delighted that we were able to go out and get the three points.

“Not only was it a good result, but we were able to sort a few things out as well.

“I don’t really know where all these goals are coming from to be honest. I’ve just been really lucky to be getting in those positions and on Saturday I was quite lucky to have slipped through unnoticed and it wasn’t the cleanest of hits if I’m being honest.

“I’ve scored a few scrappy goals for Morton, so I want to try and get a few more. 

“But to have three goals for a centre-half isn’t that bad is it?

“The ball in on Saturday made it quite easy for me to get into that kind of position again after I’ve hung around after the corner.

“I wasn’t really bothered about the goal at the time, I was just wanting the three points at that point.”

The towering centre-half believes that the Recreation Park victory was the best overall performance that the Ton have put in since his arrival back in August.

Baird was delighted after all the hard work that went in over the course of the week to secure the result.

He added: “I’m delighted for the boys, because we worked so hard for that and we can’t be kidded, Alloa is a tough place to go and play on the Astro.

“Alloa are a good team and they pass the ball about really well and we managed to weather a bit of a storm in the first half and in the second half we were much better.

“I really enjoyed playing in the second half, it was probably our best performance to date.”