Lawless vows to carry on his spot-kick duties despite penalty miss

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Steven Lawless says he will still be first to put his hand up to take a penalty – despite his Rugby Park spot-kick being saved in this Championship clash.

The Dunfermline star had the chance to fire his side ahead in the 24th minute but goalkeeper Zach Hemming was equal to the effort and saved well.

Lawless made up for it by scoring the opening goal on the hour mark, but it wasn’t enough as a Kyle Lafferty brace ensured the Pars headed back to Fife empty-handed.

But it won’t put Lawless off grabbing the ball for the next penalty.

He said: “What happened with the penalty? I’ve picked a side.

“Normally, I wait for the keeper to move, I don’t know why I’ve not done that, I’ve made a mistake and the keeper has got there and made a good save. But I should do better.

“Listen, the best players in the world miss penalties. It’s going to happen. I’ve still got a good record. It’s disappointing not to score but I’ll be putting my name forward for the next one.

“Whether the boys will let me take it is another story. But you need to show bravery to take it and I’ll put myself up there again.”

Lawless reckons the Pars did well to pick themselves up after his missed spot-kick as they created countless chances before he fired the opener into the roof of the net.

He said: “It’s not what you want and it was a disappointment for myself more than most. I said sorry to the boys but these things happen.

“We did well in the second half up until we scored. If we had rode it out a bit longer we might have grown back into the game but we kind of dropped off as a team and when you have a player like Lafferty and allow crosses into the box it’s eventually going to come to something.

“So hopefully we can learn from it because we have them in a couple of weeks again and we want to put this right.

“When you get yourself ahead you have to see out the game and take at least a point.

“We were in a winning position and wanted to take all three, so it’s disappointing to come away with nothing.

“We changed a little bit after we scored. We sat back and that’s something we need to sort.”

Dunfermline manager John Hughes said: “We did enough to get something out of the game, if not win it.”

Kyle Lafferty scores his acrobatic winner for Killie.