Managers Post St Johnstone

25/02/12: JM- "Fair play to St Johnstone they were miles better than us today and fully deserved their result.

Dunfermline Manager Jim McIntyre claimed that he was feeling the most disappointed that he has been in the last six or seven weeks. He said:-

"The fighting spirit has been great; the players have had a lot of praise recently but today there was a real lack of that. They have got a lot of plaudits recently because of the togetherness that they have shown but the fighting spirit wasn't there in the first half and we were lucky to go in with the scoreline as it was. (0-2)

"The overall scoreline flattered us. We just weren't good enough."

The result at Kilmarnock did not help the Manager's mood:-

"Obviously you do not want your nearest rivals to win but the bottom line is we just have to look after ourselves. It is our results that are going to be the difference but if we perform like that then there's no doubt what will happen. That is the worst performance in probably two months in terms of the lack of fighting spirit there. That was the most disappointing thing."

Macca confirmed that all three substitutions, completed by 55 minutes, were tactical and squashed suggestions that things were getting ominous for the Pars:-

"No it is not ominous, it is one performance. When we scored we had a period but St Johnstone went on and got the third goal. That kind of thing knocked the stuffing out of us. It is no more than what we deserved over the balance of play.

"Maybe Wednesday night took more out of them than I thought but that's me surmising, we just don't know. The players never turned up today, that's it in a nutshell. I am not going to look for excuses saying we had a hard game during the week, we had plenty time to recover. We have been here earlier in the season and won. St Johnstone had lost as many games at home as we had so it is not as if they have got a blinding home record.

"We felt that we had a good chance of coming here and getting the result but fair play to St Johnstone they were miles better than us today and fully deserved their result.

St Johnstone Manager Steve Lomas said:-

"It probably could have been a lot more comfortable than what it was. We scored some very good goals and Cillian was very unlucky at the end when he hit the post. Croft hit the upright as well.

"It is getting to the business end, it is not about performances it is about results. I thought it was a pretty good performance until a goal where I don't know how a guy can stand in front of your goalkeeper, miles offside and not being interfering with play. It is just a mockery, the rule has got to be clarified because it is a nonsense rule.

"The fans should enjoy this. For the first time in a while, the St Johnstone fans are looking up instead of looking down and that's all credit to the players.

"But we aren't getting too far ahead of ourselves at the moment. There are many more tough tests to come and we can't get ahead of ourselves. Football can change in the space of 10 seconds like we saw in the cup.

"We saw it today; they got a goal and then all of a sudden you get a bit nervous."