The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
MacLean determined to keep ‘shock’ off his CV
Steven MacLean has managed to avoid being the victim of a big cup upset in a long football career, writes Eric Nicolson. And he’s determined that won’t change at McDiarmid Park this weekend.
Saints welcome Stenhousemuir to town – a club whose name will forever be in the Perth club’s history for the 4-0 giant-killing in 1995.
But MacLean pledged that the League One outfit won’t be taken lightly on Saturday.
“The Scottish Cup is a great competition and hopefully we’ll be able to go deep into it,” he said.
“Stenhousemuir will get our respect, though, because they have picked up lately and it’s definitely a tough game.
“I’ve not really been involved in any shocks during my career and I don’t want to start now.
“I was with Aberdeen when they got beat from Raith Rovers but they used to lose to lower league teams all the time, so that wasn’t really a massive shock.
“But, apart from that, there hasn’t really been any and it’s not something I want on my CV.”
When MacLean was a Sheffield Wednesday player he was on the verge of a famous cup victory.
“We nearly put Man City out but ended up drawing and losing the replay,” he recalled.
“They were a good team, they had Samaras, Ball, Distan and Richards playing for them.
“One thing is for sure, there will be a shock somewhere on the card this weekend – we just have to make sure it isn’t St Johnstone.
“We loved winning the cup a few years ago and it would be a massive achievement to get back there again.
“But it will be tough, it gets harder every year because so many teams are improving.
“Right now, though, all we can focus on is Stenhousemuir and the lads here will be giving them every respect.
“As a group we’ve always done that, our record in the cup has been good over the last few years and it’s something we want to add to.”
Saints haven’t played since the Hogmanay defeat to Dundee and MacLean isn’t convinced that the Premiership shutdown is worthwhile.
He explained: “Personally I would have preferred to keep playing because, although it was good to get a week off, we’re back into a hectic schedule.
“So you do wonder what the point is when we could have played a few Saturday games.
“If we’re going to have a break then you should play more matches at the start of the season in the better weather, rather than come back into playing Saturday, Wednesday for a few weeks.
“So you can look at it either way, really.
“We did well in the first half of the season, although we do think we should have more points than we do.
“But we’re in the top six and the aim is to stay there now.
“So we’re just keen to get back playing again with the cup this weekend then look to securing a place in the top six.”