Rob risks final miss to battle SFA ban
STEPHEN ROBINSON is ready to risk a Betfred Cup Final ban to appeal an SFA charge for his bust-up with Pedro Caixinha.
The Well boss was delighted to see his side
leapfrog Gers into third place in the Premiership courtesy of last night’s 1-0 win away to Dundee.
But his joy was tempered by the news that SFA compliance officer Tony McGlennan has issued a notice of complaint for his part in Sunday’s controversial cup semi-final when he was sent to the stand for a bust-up with the Rangers boss.
Caixinha accepted his one-match ban last night, having been cited by McGlennan earlier in the week, but defiant Robinson vowed to fight the charge on principal, insisting he did nothing wrong.
The Well boss will now argue his case to a disciplinary panel when his hearing takes place on November 9.
If his appeal is booted out he could face a bigger punishment than the onematch ban offered by the compliance officer.
That could see him stuck in the stand at Hampden rather than leading his team out for the final on November 26.
But Robinson vowed to
have his day in front of the beaks to plead his case and insisted it would be an injustice if he was denied his dream moment of leading his side into the biggest occasion of his career.
Robinson said: “I will deal with the hearing when it comes around. I don’t think I did a whole lot wrong, I didn’t leave my technical area or anything. We will speak to the SFA and I hope they will be sensible about it.
“I would be devastated if I can’t lead the team out in the final. I think it would be an injustice to say the least.”
Robinson hailed his side for grinding out a hard-fought win at Dens Park after a draining week dominated by heated debate about Motherwell’s physical style.
He added: “I’m delighted with the result and I thought for the first 20 minutes we were excellent.
“We scored a great goal and we should have been two up as Alex Fisher had a great chance. The boys who came in impressed me.
“That is our best result of the season. We haven’t been brilliant but the good thing is we are grinding out results.”
Dundee boss Neil McCann was furious at ref Stephen Finnie for chopping off an equaliser before the break, claiming scorer Sofien Moussa had fouled Well defender Peter Hartley in the build up.
McCann said: “It’s so hard as a manager to not lose your composure. That is a number of huge decisions that have gone against us recently – big game-changing decisions. Finnie said to me at half-time there had been a tiny or soft push. If we are giving freekicks for that then the game is stopping every two minutes.
“That’s a goal that would have got us level going into the break then coming out looking to go for the winner.
“It’s hard to take because there’s a really unjust feeling. It’s a tough job these referees have but it’s a tough one that we have too.”