BUTCHER AND PALS WANT TO STAKE PLACE
CALUM BUTCHER has heard all the crazy stories about Neil Warnock from his old team-mates.
And the Motherwell defender aims to leave the new Aberdeen manager hopping mad tonight by unleashing his Scottish Cup frustration on the Dons.
Butcher is still bristling at losing a physical battle to Morton last Friday night as Well were turfed out of the Scottish Cup.
Being outmuscled is not something the Steelmen accept.
And as they head to Pittodrie with the two sides locked on 25 points in the bottom half of the table, the former Millwall and Burton Albion defender says they have to learn the tough lessons of Cappielow to leave Warnock seeing red.
He said: “Of course being told we lost the physical battle hurts.
“We pride ourselves as a team in being physical and doing the ugly side of the game right.
“For long periods of that Morton game we didn’t do that. We got sucked into how they wanted to play and didn’t stamp our authority on the game.
“There are no excuses to why it happened. We knew it was a difficult draw and they were in good form... but so were we.
“It will take some time to get that out of our system.
“There was a lot of frustration and anger. We need to try to collectively correct it and move forward as quickly as possible.
“I’ve never played against one of Neil Warnock’s teams but I know a lot of boys who have played for him and against him.
“Hopefully we can get one over on Aberdeen.
“He does some crazy stuff but that’s part of how he wants to manage.
“Even in my time at Burton, when I was there years ago, there were a lot of players who came up against or worked with him.
“He’s old school. He’ll definitely go and get a reaction from the Aberdeen boys.
“But we’ve got to go up there and nullify them straight away.”
Butcher knows the main Dons threat needing silenced is Bojan Miovski, who has 10 goals in his last 10 outings.
He said: “Miovski is a good player. They have a lot of good players in their team and probably shouldn’t be where they are, with the squad they’ve got and the budget they have.
“They’ll want to kick on as much as they can. We need to nullify Miovski and try to get a result.”
This time last season Well went on to win nine of their last 14 games when Stuart Kettlewell replaced Steven Hammell after a cup exit to Raith.
Butcher added: “It’s our only objective left – to finish as high up the league as we possibly can.
“We were sitting bottom of the league this time last year and went on a fantastic run.
“We know we can do the same again this year and that would put us right in the mix for the top six.”