It’ll be good to get Celtic games rout our system
JOE SHAUGHNESSY doesn’t mind the prospect of another tough trip to Glasgow because at least St Johnstone won’t be facing the green half of the city this time.
The Saints defender admitted the Perth men are feeling battered and bruised after playing on-song Celtic three times in 12 days.
The Hoops stuck nine goals past them in 270 minutes in the league and Cup, topped off by Sunday’s 5-0 mauling at Parkhead.
While Saints are still in the Premiership’s top six they are desperate to stop the rot after five defeats on the bounce.
Another jaunt down the M9 to take on Rangers at Ibrox this weekend means that won’t be easy but Shaughnessy is just happy he’s not facing Celtic again.
The skipper said: “We’re still in a good position in the league so we’ll just move on and put this behind us.
“It’s disappointing to be out of the Cup but we’ll put that behind us and look ahead to getting back to winning ways.
“It’s about getting back to doing what we’re good at but at least we’ll have a good week’s training. It’s not like going to Celtic Park and spending the entire game chasing the ball. That takes a lot out of you but having that free week will help us to go again.” Saints also lost to Hearts and
JOE SHAUGHNESSY ON
“Okay, it’s against Rangers at Ibrox but at least it’s a change from Celtic.
BY MICHAEL GANNON Hamilton during their brutal run but Shaughnessy admitted there was no point in sugarcoating Sunday’s Scottish Cup stuffing by Celts.
The afternoon started badly, with Saints a goal down inside three minutes, and it went rapidly downhill from there.
The Irish stopper said: “We gave ourselves a mountain to climb. When you go there you need to stay in the game and at least get to half-time at 0-0 or better but we were left with too much to do after losing poor goals so early.
“From there they can just keep the ball. They don’t even need to create anything, they just wear you out and that’s what happened.
“We’ve played them three times in our last five games and that’s the hardest run we could have had but we can’t allow this result to affect our campaign.”
Saints boss Tommy Wright is keen to pick up the pieces as his men face a tough run of fixtures in the next few weeks.
They head to Ibrox on Saturday, then it’s Aberdeen and Hibs in Perth on the horizon.
Wright said: “I can draw a line under it, hopefully the players can draw a line under it as well, but we have tough games coming up.
“We have Rangers away, then Aberdeen and Hibs, though we’ve taken four points from both of them.
“The beauty of football is you have an opportunity to get back on track and we have an opportunity at Ibrox.
“We will rest and get back to work hard now until the end of the season.”