Martindale: I’m not delusional... I know the task we still face
A defeat here would have confirmed Livingston’s relegation to the Championship.
Instead, they emerged with a thoroughly merited win, although the fat lady is still practising her scales.
The Lions are now nine points adrift of Ross County in the play-off position but two of their four remaining fixtures are away to Motherwell and Hibernian and the Lions possess the worst record on the road in the top flight.
When Livi comfortably defeated Motherwell 2-0 here on October 7 they were in the top six and relegation seemed unlikely to say the least.
Manager Davie Martindale remains realistic about their prospects of survival, but this was only their third win in the 27 Premiership matches since then tells its own story.
“Our intensity, application and ability was there for all to see and that’s testament to the players,” he said. “It gives you hope but I’ve also got to be pragmatic – winning isn’t going to change the way I think about the game.
“We’ll go away, pick up the three points, come back in and try to win three points again on Saturday. I’m not delusional and we know the task. We only have ourselves to blame but we dug out the win and that’s all you can do. It’s how I’ve operated at Livi for the last eight years.
“I don’t like putting targets on things because at this level – at a club this size – there’s a good chance you’ll fail so how do you deal with that adversity? In a good season, we win 33% of our games.
“What am I doing the other 67%t of the time? Trying to pick players and staff up.
“Nothing is going to change in my approach and how I manage. You can get sidetracked on medium and longterm goals and key performance indicators but, if you don’t win your next game, you’re kidding yourself on.”
Martindale revealed that there haven’t been any discussions with the players this year about the plight they find themselves in.
“I’ve put talk of
relegation away,” he said. “We’ve spoken about it as a group previously, pre January. It’s been hanging over our heads for seven months.
“When that happens, you then focus on the next game and that’s all I do. How I came into work four Mondays ago won’t change how I come in this Monday. You’d be daft if you hadn’t spoken about it as a group, though.
“I’m not really happier now [after the victory], no. I’m probably a wee bit more positive than if I hadn’t won. But am I happier going home in the car or waking up Sunday morning?
“You have to piece the whole season together and, overall, it’s been disappointing.
“There have been moments but you can’t pat yourself on the back for failure.
“It’s probably more of a disappointment which makes it extremely difficult to enjoy moments like today.
“There have been a lot of similar performances where we’ve come out on the wrong end of the result. There are different variables – VAR decisions can go against you, sendings off – but probably the big one for me was we’ve had really bad moments when we’ve made poor decisions as individuals which affect the group.”