Stephen Robinson stays grounded after Motherwell ease past Morton in cup

Motherwell manager Stephen Robinson saw strong evidence of his new-look side coming together as they beat Morton 4-0 but he warned against expecting instant success.

The Lanarkshire side took their Betfred Cup tally to nine goals in two games as strikes from Charles Dunne, Chris Cadden, Richard Tait and substitute Louis Moult saw them take control of Group F.

Debutant Dunne was one of seven summer signings who featured for Motherwell but Robinson knows there are tougher tests to come.

When asked whether his side were further ahead than he expected, Robinson said: “Possibly but it’s going to take time. I’m not fooling myself, there is still a lot of work to do.

“You don’t bring nine players in and have instant success, that’s not going to happen. But you can see the makings of what we are trying to do.

“All the good football we played, we earned the right to play that and that’s the biggest plus point for me.”

Morton were seriously under strength after Ricki Lamie joined long-term absentees Thomas O’Ware and Lee Kilday among their injured central defenders.

Midfielder Connor McManus had to fill in at centre-back 24 hours after joining the club and Morton’s task became even more difficult when Gary Harkins was sent off for a high challenge after six minutes. Only some impressive saves from Derek Gaston kept the score down.

Manager Jim Duffy said: “You need all your best players available to compete and unfortunately we don’t have that at the minute. We were decimated with injury at the back and had Gary sent off, and had Gary Oliver missing as well – he has been in hospital for a few days with a viral infection.

“We had one recognised centre-back, who is a player-coach, in Darren Barr, who is also playing with an injury.”