Kris Boyd and Steve Clarke (right) show off their December awards

Kilmarnock forward Kris Boyd has signed a contract extension to stay at Rugby Park for next season.

Boyd, 34, has scored 12 goals this season, having triggered the option of another year on his deal last May.

"I've had an excellent relationship with the club all along," said Boyd, who is the Premiership player of the month for December.

"I said the last time I came back that would probably be me back here to finish my career."

Boyd is in his third spell at Killie, having made his debut for the Ayrshire club in May 2001.

Manager Steve Clarke, also picking up a monthly prize from the Premiership's sponsors, is delighted to be retaining the services of his top scorer.

"You need good experience in your squad but you need good experience and I think Kris is a good example of that," he said.

"His record's there for everyone to see. If you put the ball in the box, and it falls to Kris, nine times out of 10 it's going to end up in the back of the net, which is a good thing to have.

"But he's also important to us off the pitch; we've got quite a lot of young players here, we've got players from all over the country and Kris is one of the key personnel in the dressing room for pulling that squad together and making sure everyone's working properly."

Kilmarnock were unbeaten last month, winning four times and drawing twice, with Boyd scoring six goals during that run.

'I felt as if it was time to move over'

He has already bettered his tally of goals from the previous three campaigns and currently sits on 119 in total for the Rugby Park side.

But the former Rangers, Middlesbrough, Portland Timbers and Scotland striker admitted he had pondered bowing out.

"It definitely means the decision to carry on playing was the right one," he explained.

"There were days not so long ago that I felt as if it was time to move over, let somebody else come through and take the club forward.

"I think after the conversations I had with the people round about the place, the right thing was to stay here. I managed to get myself on a football pitch playing regular again. I've always been that type - if you're playing, you're scoring goals, you're happy."

Boyd scored twice as Kilmarnock came from behind to beat Rangers 2-1 last month

Boyd also had words of praise for manager Clarke, who arrived at Rugby Park in mid-October and has lifted Killie up to sixth place.

"He's galvanised the whole town," Boyd said. "When you look at the last three months since the gaffer came in, the transformation of the football club is night and day.

"On the pitch, we're very, very hard to break down. We can cause teams problems going forward as well and I think we've shown that with the results we've had, especially the month of December.

"You go back to the last one at Easter Road [in the 1-1 draw with Hibernian], it wasn't our best performance but it was a tough ground to go, we came away with a point.

"So it shows even when we're not playing well, we can definitely pick up points."