'Bare bones' Motherwell had Rangers rattled at the end, says skipper

Paul McGinn admits Motherwell were down to the bare bones, but had Rangers rattled in the closing stages of their 2-1 defeat at Hampden.

McGinn is no stranger to facing the Glasgow giants at the National Stadium, having done the same with Queen’s Park, but says it lacked the intimidation of Ibrox as they went toe-to-toe with them.

Goals from Cyriel Dessers and Vaclav Cerny either side of a Robin Propper own-goal saw Rangers take all three points, but a late chance from Zach Robinson forced a terrific one-handed save from Jack Butland to maintain their lead.

Captain McGinn, who played his first 90 minutes since recovering from an ankle injury, said: “We rode our luck in the first half and probably could have been a few down, so we can’t have many complaints.

“But I thought we got stronger as the game went on – Rangers were definitely nervy right at the end, weren’t they?

“A lesser goalkeeper and it [Robinson’s chance[ probably is 2-2 but Jack Butland got a great hand to it.

“Lennon Miller had a chance early on and I suppose we rode our luck a bit, but we’re at our bare bones, we know that, and I thought we put on a good performance.

“With the injuries we’ve got, it was heartening to perform like that.”

On playing against Rangers at Hampden, McGinn said: “Weirdly enough I’ve done it before with Queen’s Park years ago, so I was kinda used to it.

“It’s different, because the Rangers fans aren’t right on top of you, so you’ve not got that same intimidation, but they definitely started as if they were the home team.”

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