David Keltjens scored on his debut to earn St Johnstone a 1-1 draw against Aberdeen after his skipper Liam Gordon twice fell foul of dubious game-changing VAR decisions.

Gordon was penalised for a foul on Jamie McGrath after Graham Carey thought he had volleyed Saints in front in the 49th minute.

And the defender was again adjudged to have committed a foul after John Beaton was called to his monitor by video assistant Steven Kirkland for a second time to review an incident in the other box.

Bojan Miovski took advantage as he converted the 62nd-minute penalty.

McGrath had already cleared the ball towards Carey when he was caught on the foot by Gordon and the penalty incident was similar. The centre-back was ruled to have caught Slobodan Rubezic as both attempted to meet Connor Barron’s corner.

Neither foul seemed clear and obvious, certainly to the vast majority of the 3,472 fans inside McDiarmid Park.

But Saints refused to fall victim to a hard-luck story and Keltjens took advantage of some poor goalkeeping from Kelle Roos to head home in the 78th minute as Aberdeen missed the chance to move into the cinch Premiership top six.

Israel international Keltjens came in at right wing-back as St Johnstone manager Craig Levein made five changes following his side’s Scottish Cup defeat by Airdrie.

Top goalscorer Nicky Clark dropped out with a minor groin injury to leave St Johnstone’s starting 11 with only four league goals between them this season.

Aberdeen manager Barry Robson named the same team for the third game running as he looked for a hat-trick of wins for the first time since September.

The Dons made the better start and Saints goalkeeper Dimitar Mitov pulled off a good stop from Dante Polvara’s powerful strike.

But the remainder of the first half was completely lacking in incidents of note as both teams struggled to make inroads.

The game livened up in the second half, with Carey denied the opener when his well-struck volley beat Roos at his near post after the midfielder’s free-kick eventually came back to him.

The chances were suddenly flowing at both ends. Matt Smith twice set up Diallang Jaiyesimi but the striker was denied by a good stop from Roos before dragging a shot wide.

Graeme Shinnie forced a save from Mitov following a bursting run and the Bulgarian tipped over Nicky Devlin’s deep cross.

More VAR confusion followed for the fans before Miovski netted his 17th goal of the season.

The writing was on the wall for Saints given Aberdeen had recorded 1-0 wins in four of their previous five visits to Perth.

But Levein’s side showed fight and Keltjens had a header saved before beating Roos to Carey’s cross to head into the empty net.

Rubezic and Carey were both booked for diving in the box before an exciting eight minutes of stoppage time.

Aberdeen sub Ester Sokler saw a good headed chance saved by Mitov before Max Kucheriavyi hit the outside of the post at the other end.

Liam Gordon remains steadfast in his belief that St Johnstone can recover from their disastrous start to the season and preserve their cinch Premiership status.

The Perth club are five points adrift at the foot of the table and without a manager after Steven MacLean was sacked in the wake of Saturday’s 4-0 defeat at St Mirren – a ninth successive league match without a win.

Alex Cleland is in interim charge for Wednesday’s match at home to Kilmarnock, and captain Gordon is confident Saints – who have been in the top flight since 2009 – can get themselves out of their grim predicament in the months ahead.

“I 100 per cent believe we can turn it round quickly,” he said. “We’ve got a good squad here. We just need to start putting together performances and churning out results, which we’re more than capable of doing.

“I’m positive we will go on and do that under whoever the new manager is. This league is where we should be. We’ll keep fighting until the end.

“We’ve got a good squad here and we know what we’re capable of. Now it’s up to us to produce results to put points on the board and get ourselves up that table.”

MacLean claimed after Saturday’s defeat at St Mirren that some Saints players had “chucked it”, and Gordon admitted that is an accusation that everyone at the club is never able to be repeated.

“As a professional, that’s one thing you’d never want to be associated with,” he said. “As for those comments, I don’t know who they were aimed at, but all we can do as a group is take that on the chin and make sure it can never be said again about us either as individuals or as a group because as professional athletes we should pride ourselves on turning up and doing our jobs as best we can.

“Yes, there will be mistakes – they happen all the time – but the bare minimum here at St Johnstone is to give 110 per cent.

“We’ve had a lot of success here from past years, whether that be top-six finishes, European runs and cup success. But obviously it’s been a bit different the past few seasons and you learn a lot from that.

“When you’re winning stuff it’s all smooth and it’s great, but you start learning stuff when your back’s against the wall, and that’s where we’re at now.

“We’ve been here before as a group, I’ve been here before as an individual, so we know what’s expected and what’s required going forward. We’re ready for it.”

Liam Gordon is adamant St Johnstone will not panic after being dragged back into a relegation battle.

The Perth men looked comfortable just a couple of months ago as they chased a place in the top six while other teams near the bottom struggled for form.

But after failing to win any of their last seven games, they go into the post-split fixtures having allowed 10th-placed Dundee United and 11th-placed Kilmarnock to close to within two points of them, while they are just six points clear of last-placed Ross County.

Captain Gordon – whose side needed a relegation play-off to survive last term – is adamant he and his colleagues will not allow the renewed threat to their cinch Premiership status to spook them.

“It’s not rocked us at all,” he said ahead of Saturday’s showdown with United at McDiarmid Park. “It’s obviously a position we didn’t want to find ourselves in because of the position we were in (recently) but these things happen in football.

“We had a couple of poor weeks and we find ourselves in this situation and it’s up to ourselves to get out of it but I wouldn’t say we’re rocked at all.

“We know the task at hand, we’re all prepared and we’re ready to do it. The pressure is always high at any stage of the season but obviously it is coming to crunch time.

“We’ve got five cup finals left, and it’s not just us who will be looking at it like that. But if we apply ourselves the way we know we can and keep to the level of performance we put in against Hibs (in the recent 1-1 draw), we should be good.”

Gordon has been impressed by the manner in which his former team-mate Steven MacLean has handled himself since stepping up to become interim manager following the sacking of Callum Davidson last month.

“He’s been really good,” said the defender. “He’s obviously been in a coaching role for a while so he’s got that experience under his belt but he’s always been very knowledgeable, you could see that from the way he played the game himself.

“He had a great understanding of the game, he was a very clever player. He’s obviously his own man and he’s putting his own ideas across, and the players are really buying into it and enjoying it.

“We’ve had a couple of good training weeks and the Hibs game was a good performance, so it’s been all positive. The boys are upbeat and we’re ready for the fight.”