The Beast from the East was no match for the community spirit shown by those involved with St Mirren's Youth Academy, as hundreds turned up to clear Ralston of the snow.
Allan McManus spoke with pride about the players, parents, staff and fans who turned up on Sunday to help clear the training facility at Ralston of the heavy snowfall that was endured from last week and over the weekend.
He said: "It's unbelievable. But it doesn't surprise me at this football club.
"We've got a fantastic community and team spirit, and that radiates from the first team, set by the manager, and all the way down through the academy; and obviously that buy-in from the parents to continually push and promote what we do at the academy.
"As we seen yesterday I think we had over 200 parents, players and academy members of staff. The gaffer was down as well - mucking in - and it just shows you the community spirit and camaraderie that we have here."
Allan believes that the togetherness and standards set by the club will only be a good thing for the Academy players, and will stand them in good stead as their careers progress at St Mirren.
He continued: "I think it reiterates to the parents of the players within the academy, to remind them that's what we have at this football club.
"There are teams out there who say they have a clear link to their first team and it's maybe not the case. But you can see it here and that's driven from the manager and that radiates right down - with the assistance of myself, Andy and Ross and all the other members of staff.
"That comes from the standards set. That's why the first team recently have been successful on the pitch, and that's why the academy, over a period of time, has been successful producing young players, because of the standards set at this football club.
"It's important that when those standards are set at the top that they feed down into the academy and don't get lost on the way - but the parents can see that. I think for the parent's yesterday, they had a real feeling of being part of something, and that's what we want to create here."
First team manager Jack Ross was out assisting with snow shovelling as well, in order to give his team the best possible preparation as the league run-in beckons, with his side sitting eight points clear at the top of the Scottish Championship.
Allan said: "The first team will always be priority and where we are in the league right now we want to make sure that the first team have got places to train regularly. I don't think the pitch would have been cleared until the latter stages of the week, but with the great effort of everybody involved yesterday, we've cleared that pitch in one hour and 10 minutes.
"It's meant that the manager now has an option to train on there with the first team and prepare properly for the weekend. The academy training will be on all week as normal - and looking forward to match day at the weekend as well. It gives the players a head start and make sure they get a full week of training behind them."
The Saints' U20s SPFL Development League game against Dundee was due to take place tomorrow at New Western Park, Renfrew, but has now been postponed due to the weather conditions.
"We popped down to Renfrew to have a look at the surface and it's still under several inches of snow.
"Again, it shows you that if you have the spirit we have at this football club, that if there was a game to be played here (Ralston) tomorrow, because of everybody's enthusiasm and team spirit towards the football club, our games would go ahead during the week."
