'Well's cup hopes end at Hampden

[Footymad]

Motherwell failed to overturn the odds and lost the Betfred final to Celtic. Two second half goals, one following a much disputed penalty, ended our hopes and led to a 2-0 defeat. - External Link

[LawSteelman]

The penalty was a ridiculous decision and only further demonstrates how much of a hold Celtic have over referees and how weak and useless Thomson is. Had Rangers got a penalty like that this place and just about every other forum and media outlet would be branding the referee all the cheats of the day and the masons and the lodges etc would be getting the blame.

However. Don't kid yourself that that decision materially influenced the outcome because we were never in that game and couldn't get near Celtic to lay a glove on them. I just thought they were too sharp, too strong and too quick for us and were comfortable throughout. As soon as the first goal went in that was that.

There were no positives to take today apart from the support our fans gave the team, they were excellent and we can look back with fondness on the League Cup run of 2017 and in particular the Aberdeen and Rangers results. The Semi was our Final if we're being honest.

[hutchie59]

We got to the final by being in the face of the opposition, pressing them and contesting every ball. I fear the manager out thought himself today by giving Celtic too much respect. We sat off and contained rather than going for the win. A major disappointment because we had to score to win. It was odds on that Thomson would send a Well player to the stand.Just think he is Scotland's representative in Euro and world competitions!

[tintowellfan]

Not much to say. Just gutted for all the young kids that saw a diving cheat, and a useless referee. Wow, hope they might come back again sometime to see the well again. But not convinced they will, why would any parent take their kids to see that???

[numpty13]

Looked to me like the plan was to contain first half and step it up second. Was working fine, more or less, even after they scored their first we started making chances. But we were never going to win it from behind even with eleven on the park, and the penalty fiasco turned it into a complete non-event.

[Handsome_Devil]

We played well. You don't get through a half against Celtic not giving up a single chance without doing something right and the wee sniffs they had were no more or less dangerous than what we had at the other end.

If offered before the game 55 mins with one chance each we'd all have taken it. But Forrest finds the far corner, Gordon makes a wonderful save and we're done. That's the difference in quality 14 times the wages gets you.

The penalty was one of the most hilariously bad Old Firm decisions ive ever seen. You'd hope Thomson will be embarrassed but I doubt it. It likely made no difference but we'll never know and the players deserved their 'what if' half hour rather than it being ended by a comical dive.

So no disgrace in falling short for me, especially since unlike in 2005 and 2011 we actually turned up - we just got beat by a better team.

A glorious cup run and Accies in January certainly doesn't mean no chance in the Scottish to come.

[wellin]

We contained them in the first half pretty well I thought, Celtic didn't have a decent chance of note in the first half while we had a couple of tame efforts. We gave away the ball cheaply for Celtics first goal, good finish but we made it to easy. What came after that was a complete joke. First of all if that was a penalty to Celtic, then Moult's was a stonewaller. How the Ref can be conned so easily is beyond me, weak Refereeing doesn't even come close to describing it. It was an atrocious decision and it ruined the game there and then. Would it have changed the outcome? Probably not but what it did do was kill any chance we had. Now to that diving cheating b****** Sinclair, by the way, I thought up until then he was Celtics main man, he was drifting in and out, we were struggling to cope with him. In his words he said "i felt contact and went down, I didn't dive". I felt contact and went down, if that statement isn't an admittance to diving i don't know what is. What contact was there, I certainly can't see any contact that merits a guy to hit the deck like he's been done by a sniper. He's ruined a young players first final, the guy is lower than a snakes belly. Watching the big man go of the pitch in tears last night made you feel for him. We go again on Wednesday, I know what i would do if i had the chance of a 50 50 with Sinclair. This time he would hit the deck, but i would make sure he didn't get back on his feet again.

[Wellup4it]

Looked to me like the plan was to contain first half and step it up second. Was working fine, more or less, even after they scored their first we started making chances.

Yes, that was the game plan. We played well to limit Celtic's chances and even at 1-0 I thought we were in with a shout. However, 2 bad, bad decisons killed the game. Firstly, Tierney fouls Moult in the box and had he been sent off and we'd been awarded the penalty it might have been a different game. The second costly blunder by Thomson was to award a penalty to Celtic and send Kipre off when there was minimal contact. Two huge decisions which Thomson got badly wrong.

Its hard enough to beat Celtic with a decent referee but its impossible if the match official makes critical errors that work against you. To the team's credit they didn't fold when down to 10 men.

[bheron]

I agree with LSM when he says that Celtic, would probably have won the game anyway. If the INon) penalty was given when it was 0-0 I would have said it was a game changer. But it was 1-0 at that point and the way we were playing, we were never going to score 2 goals. However I agree that it ended the game as any type of contest. The other thing we have to remember is that, he was a very lucky boy not to get sent of for the earlier tackle.

[texaco cup]

No doubt the better team won yesterday.But I just wonder how much the media and Brendan Rodgers complaining about us being a physical team had a bearing on how we played in the final,giving Celtic time and space on the ball allowed them to dictate the play and gave them time to pick their passes,something we didn’t allow Aberdeen and Rangers to do. No doubt the penalty call had a bearing on the game,but as previously stated in other posts Kipre could have been sent off earlier.I hope we have learned from our tactics yesterday and get right in the faces of Celtic on Wednesday night and dent their so called invincibility COYW