Motherwell boss Robbo lauds match winner Danny Johnson

Motherwell manager Stephen Robinson lauded match winner Danny Johnson after his troops battled to a 1-0 Betfred Cup second round victory at Livingston on Saturday, writes Craig Goldthorp.
Well gaffer Stephen Robinson encourages his side at Livingston (Pic by Ian McFadyen)Well gaffer Stephen Robinson encourages his side at Livingston (Pic by Ian McFadyen)
Well gaffer Stephen Robinson encourages his side at Livingston (Pic by Ian McFadyen)

"He's a goalscorer," Robinson said. "And whichever combination I put him with he looks like he is going to score goals."He's hit the post or crossbar and then he had a great finish, a super finish on that surface."He'll get better and better. Fitness wise we're getting 60 or 70 minutes out of him, same with Alex Gorrin."These boys will get fitter and stronger as the season goes on."Robinson thought the win was well merited."We created a lot of chances that could have made it a lot more comfortable for ourselves but you've got to credit Livi in the second half," Robbo said."They went direct, they caused us problems but we dealt with it and I thought it was a super battling performance."Obviously in a cup competition you throw everything at it."But I thought the lads put a real performance in and that's what we're about."Livi didn't create any clear cut chances."I thought our back three and then our back four were excellent and dealt with any long balls that came in and limited them to shots from distance."We on the other hand had chances to win the game. And maybe we could be better with our passing and decision making in the second half."But that will come. The most important thing in this cup competition is to get results."Robinson said there had never been any panic from him after the club lost its first two Scottish Premiership matches against Hibs and Hamilton.He added: "If you look at our injury list last year, we couldn't have coped with that, we wouldn't have won this game."But what we've done is strengthen. We were able to bring Aaron Sinclair off the bench, Conor Sammon off the bench and we were able to rest Allan Campbell who has had a week off over the summer and he looked a bit jaded."I genuinely believe that's stood us in good stead for this game and moving forward. Of course it can kickstart the season."