Martin calls on Pars to reproduce cup heroics in the league
AS strange as it may sound, for Dunfermline, becoming the first team in 28 attempts to take Celtic the distance in a domestic cup competition was probably the easy part.
Ensuring the levels of application and concentration they exhibited at Celtic Park, as well as the quality they showed on the ball, are equally as evident when they take on the flotsam and jetsam of the Championship is now the stated mission.
‘Our game plan was to defend and counter-attack when we could,’ said left-back Lewis Martin, just one of several standout performers for the men from Fife.
‘Stevie Crawford, Greg Shields and Jason Dair had gone through tactics all week and I think it showed that it worked. We knew how to play against Celtic, sitting in and looking to counter, and I thought we did that brilliantly.
‘The first two games of the Championship we’ve done well in but drawn. We should be sitting with six points but only have two.
‘After that performance, we should have massive confidence. Now we need to go on and do it in the league each week.’
For all Crawford’s men defended extraordinarily well throughout the 120 minutes, this was no loading of the sandbags and drawings of the bayonets.
When they got the ball, they used it wisely. The quality of service into Kevin Nisbet was matched by the striker’s ability to keep Christopher Jullien at arm’s length and bring others into play.
When Mikey Johnston struck a superb goal ten minutes after the break to put the home side in front, the time-honoured capitulation of the lower-league side did not materialise.
Frankly, Tom Beadling’s excellent finish from Andy Ryan’s cross with 13 minutes remaining was no more than the visitors deserved.
If there was pride at pushing Celtic all the way, though, there was lingering regret that they couldn’t push them that little bit further.
‘The boys were amazing,’ added Martin (above). ‘We know Celtic are the treble Treble winners and coming here we were always going to be up against it but to a man we were exceptional.
‘We fought all the way only for them to get lucky at the end (with a deflected James Forrest goal). It’s a mixture of pride and disappointment. We were gutted when the goal went in to make it 2-1 but the effort we put in throughout the entire game was different class.
‘We were starting to think it might be our day. When we got the equaliser we were pushing Celtic and it looked like we had that edge. We had them on the back foot. Penalties are a lottery. They could have gone either way but unfortunately we never got to find out.
‘We are a bit frustrated about the fact that it’s two rubbish goals we’ve lost. What happened was unfortunate but the boys should be proud of themselves. If we can do that all season, I’m sure we’ll do well.’
There is certainly no little consolation for Crawford’s men in knowing that extending the contest for a further half an hour was something beyond every side Celtic have faced in cups since Brendan Rodgers’ men saw off Motherwell 5-0 on August 10, 2016.
‘I never knew that,’ said Martin. ‘But that’s a good achievement for us taking a team like Celtic to extra-time. Had it gone to penalties, who knows what could have happened.’