STEPHEN ROBINSON isn’t one for spending his time worrying about things that are out of his control. Particularly when he has the considerable task of taking his Motherwell side to Celtic Park this weekend in search of a result ahead of him.
And he says that he isn’t about to add further fuel to a fire of speculation that has rivalled the one at nearby Strathclyde Park on Bonfire night since Hibernian followed Hearts in relieving their manager of his duties this week.
Nor, you may say, is he making any particular attempt to dampen those flames, but with no contact being made from either of the Edinburgh clubs, he is happy to maintain a stance of only addressing the issue of his future should there be something concrete to discuss.
“There has been nothing so there is no need to add fuel to a fire that isn’t there,” Robinson said. “It is hard enough to do my own job at Motherwell than it is to worry about anything else.
“I don’t need to block it out because nothing has changed. I am the Motherwell manager. I am getting on with my job to the best of my ability. I am focused on trying to get a result on Sunday. That is hard enough, but you take your eye off the ball and you feel the wrath of football.
“I think [the speculation] is a compliment to the players. I don’t go on the pitch. I set them up and my staff set them up and it is a compliment to them.
“They are doing very well and getting international recognition with Declan (Gallagher) called up, Liam (Donnelly) and Trevor (Carson) and our younger boys in the under-21 squad, so it is a credit to the players that me or anyone else is getting recognition.
“It is not just me. It is the players and the staff here that are making it work here.”
They are certainly doing that, with two wins from two following a narrow defeat at Ibrox propelling the Steelmen back into third place ahead of this weekend’s trip to Celtic Park.
Whether they remain there come Monday morning is a different matter altogether, but while Robinson knows there may not be many outside of the Motherwell support that give them a chance, there will be those among their fanbase who will.
“There is always pressure,” he said. “That is the nature of the job. Our fans will expect us to get a result and the expectation levels have risen massively and when you don’t get that there is a fallout. “Sometimes it is about convincing the players to have the same belief in themselves that I have in them. We are getting there.
“They look at the player next to them and the player on the bench and they think ‘yeah, we might have a chance’. But make no mistake, if we are to get anything at all from Sunday then we need to be at the very top of our game.”
Motherwell were at the very top of their game for parts of the recent match against Rangers in Glasgow, taking the lead at Ibrox and just falling short of at least coming away with a draw.
Robinson is drawing positives, and lessons, from the experience.
“It will be a very similar challenge against a side on top of their game,” he said. “We were positive at Ibrox against Rangers and went with two up front and we might do the same again on Sunday or we might go with a 4-3-3. We played that here at home and we were successful with it for a short time. “But we will definitely go with a positive mindset. If we go with a negative mindset and expect to get beat there is no point turning up. We will go and have a right go at it and I’ll try and make sure that there is a belief about the players.
“I certainly think there is more belief in them now than there was in the second game of the season when we played against Celtic.”
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