Stephen tells his Steelmen: Forget the final for now
MOTHERWELL manager Stephen Robinson admits his players must focus on getting their season back on track – not the Betfred Cup final.
The Steelmen travel to Aberdeen on Saturday and will bid to get back to winning ways following successive defeats to Hibs and Ross County.
Eight days later, Robinson will attempt to get his hands on silverware when Motherwell locks horns with holders Celtic at Hampden.
But the Northern Irishman insists there is no chance of his players taking their eye off the ball at Pittodrie.
He said: “No, not at all. The final will take care of itself, they’ve earned the right to be there and it’s going to be massive day for the football club.
“It’s one we’ll certainly try and be competitive in and make ourselves known and be counted. But for now we want to beat Aberdeen, we need to get back on track.
“We did not do what we had been doing against Hibs, we were back to doing that against Ross County and we’ll be doing that again against Aberdeen and that’s very much our focus at this stage.
“We feel confident and I would rather focus on us. Everyone talks about Aberdeen and their threats. Don’t get me wrong, we’re very aware of that and Derek [McInnes] and Tony [Docherty] have done great at Aberdeen, we have a very good relationship with both of them.
“We’ll speak about how we beat them and negate their threats, how we take the game to them, how we’ll play.
“It’s never a containment with us, we go and try and win every match we play, maybe sometimes to our detriment but we’ll always try and be positive.”
Goals from Ryan Bowman and Louis Moult saw the Fir Park side mount a second-half fightback in Dingwall after being 3-0 down at the break, but the visitors ran out of time their attempt to claim a point.
Despite that setback, Robinson insists he was not concerned with the performance.
He added: “We watched the game back and everyone is influenced by the score but we actually played well and created a lot of chances.
“We got undone by our defending, we spoke about it and it’s something we can rectify.
“We showed a great amount of character and should have got back to 3-3.
“We go again and make sure we take confidence from the way we played, not necessarily the result.”
Robinson used the international break to enhance the strong bond in the dressing room after organising a golf day for the squad.
He added: “Things have been very positive, the boys went golfing so the camaraderie and the spirit around the place is really good, we’ve got a terrific bunch of boys.
“We trained four days last week but we had a little day out, went for a game of golf.
“They’re a competitive bunch and they don’t like losing at anything.
“It’s massively important, to bridge the gulf that other teams are able to sign and pay for, we have to do that with team spirit and camaraderie.”