Saints accused of influencing vital penalty call
MOTHERWELL manager Graham Alexander insisted that referee Bobby Madden had been conned into awarding St Mirren the penalty which cost him victory in his first match in charge.
Home striker Lee Erwin had gone down following a challenge from Bevis Mugabi, prompting Scotland’s top official to point to the spot, but Alexander is convinced that he had been persuaded by the Paisley players and coaching staff disputing every decision in the build-up to that pivotal moment.
‘I felt it was coming because there was an influence, I thought... a lot of noise at virtually every challenge,’ said Alexander.
‘I’ve seen it back and there’s minimal contact, if any, and I feel for the guys in that dressing room because I feel they didn’t deserve that.
‘We’ve just got to take it on the chin and go again.
‘We’ll focus on the positives because we made some real good chances and we could easily have been two up at half-time.
‘But what I liked is that the players didn’t feel sorry for themselves at 1-1 and kept trying to win the game.’
Motherwell are at home to Rangers next Sunday and Alexander relishes the challenge.
‘I’ve learned that every game in football is tough but I’m looking forward to working with these players,’ added the new Fir Park boss.
‘We only had a 50-minute session with them on Friday morning and I didn’t want to overload them but I liked what I saw in the first half and, if we’d kept on doing that, we would have won the match.’
Saints manager Jim Goodwin admitted that the spot-kick may have been on the soft side.
‘Listen, you’re looking for any kind of break you can get,’ he said.
‘We knew this was going to be a difficult game because the last thing you want to do is to be the first team to face a club with a new manager because they’re going to get a reaction — and that’s what the Motherwell boys did in the first half.
‘It’s a decent point in the end. We’ve lost only twice in our last 16 matches and we’ve had to come from behind in our last two games to get a draw.
‘Motherwell are a decent team and people shouldn’t get too carried away by where they are in the league.
‘I’m sure that, under Graham, they’ll soon be rising up the table.’