ROBBO’S SO PROUD IT HURTS
STEPHEN ROBINSON admits he felt a mixture of pride and pain after clinical Celtic sent St Mirren crashing out of the Scottish Cup.
The Paisley boss saw his side put in a battling display, but he was left to rue some missed chances as the Hoops made the most of the opportunities which landed their way.
Robinson said: “I’m proud of them, but frustrated at the same time because we had chances and we weren’t clinical enough
“There has to be credit given to Celtic for the two chances they take, they are clinical, and they defended very, very well in their box.
“There were two or three blocks that were fantastic, and ultimately they were better in both 18-yard boxes.
“So, for all the stuff we did in between, they deserved to win.
“First and foremost the level of performance is what we asked for.
“We told them not to wait to see what Celtic were going to do, step forward and press them.
“I don’t think there are many teams that press Celtic the way we did, we won the ball back on numerous occasions. The fact it was so close and
we pushed them that far despite the disparity in resources is huge.
“The difference was the clinical edge that they had over us.”
Robinson was frustrated by the Cup exit but challenged Saints to surge to another top-six Premiership finish.
He said: “We now have to take that into the remaining league games and use that as a real positive.
“We have been superb over the last five or six games. Even when we were not getting the points, we were very good, very disciplined and played some very good football.
“It’s now about what we can take out of this to kick on. If we can take St Mirren into the top six for the second year in a row, that would be an incredible achievement here. It’s what I think this group of players deserve.”
Robinson is delighted to have Alex Gogic leading his side’s top-six push.
The defender was immense against Celts and unlucky not to bag a goal.
Robinson said: “He’s been a colossus for me. He is a dying breed, there’s not too many of them left. They play with knocks, they play with bruises and give absolutely everything.
“He has a lot of quality and was very unfortunate not to be on the scoresheet.”