Robinson defends under-fire player

Motherwell manager Stephen Robinson has defended “absolutely distraught” striker Ryan Bowman and insisted he is not a dirty player.

Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers has been among those to criticise Bowman after the striker’s flailing elbow broke Rangers defender Fabio Cardoso’s nose as the pair jumped for a high ball during Motherwell’s Betfred Cup semi-final triumph, having earlier been booked for a similar incident.

But Robinson hit back, saying: “Ryan is wholehearted and can be a big clumsy lump at times, but gives absolutely everything and he will not be changing the way he plays. No way.” empty-handed from Firhill despite creating a barrowload of chances.

And Meekings admitted he was so perplexed by what happened in the 2-1 defeat, he watched the game again on Saturday night on TV.

He added: “It was so frustrating at Partick. I felt we dominated the game, had large amounts of possession and some great chances.

“Then we got sucker punched with two sloppy goals at the end which killed us really. So I went away and watched it myself on Saturday night. I just wanted to see exactly how it happened. It was hard to watch as you get 70 minutes in and you wonder how we ended up losing the game.

“I was so frustrated and just couldn’t believe what had happened. I felt we were comfortable and they didn’t deserve much. But that’s football and it is nice to have a midweek game to get it out of the way and put things right.”

When asked if Dundee need to be more streetwise to see out games, Meekings said: “It is difficult to say as we were still creating so many chances.

“You get to the last 10 minutes and perhaps you are saying, ‘They have got their equaliser so we will sit behind the ball and take a point’.

“Maybe we have to look at that. As a defence, we conceded two poor goals and it has cost us.

“So you do have a look at that and see if you could have done something different. We will work on that on the training ground and hopefully that will not happen again in the future.”