MacPherson wants St Mirren to bounce back

Published on Thursday 7 May 2009 22:51

ST MIRREN manager Gus MacPherson has demanded a reaction from his players to their disappointing defeat to Inverness, and he is confident there will be a significant improvement when they face Motherwell at St Mirren Park tomorrow.

St Mirren's 2-1 defeat to Caley Thistle saw them plunged deeper into the Clydesdale Bank Premier League relegation mire and they now sit just three points above bottom spot.

MacPherson revealed he has discussed last weekend's display with his players and believes they are hurting and are determined to make amends.

He said: "We want an improvement from last Saturday, we were extremely disappointed with the performance and the players understood that – they were as disappointed as everyone else. So they know they have to improve. We've said that since we were in the SPL, if you allow your standards to drop, you'll be punished.

"We've played pretty well this season, we've given them a lot of plaudits and praise. They took the constructive criticism last week and we're looking for an improvement."

Motherwell may be the only side in the bottom six not worried about the threat of relegation but MacPherson is sure Mark McGhee's men will want to end the season on a high.

He said: "Motherwell are dangerous because they've got good players; they had a few boys in the Scotland game so that shows the quality they've got."

St Mirren are still looking for their first SPL win at their new stadium but

the Homecoming Scottish Cup wins over Motherwell and Celtic give MacPherson confidence they will soon wipe out this unwanted statistic.

He said: I'd be a lot more concerned if we hadn't won at home. But we won there against SPL opposition twice in cup ties. So there's not a concern there. It's disappointing for the fans we've not won more games but, apart from Inverness, the performances have been good at home."