Gutted Marcus Fraser firmly believes St Mirren could have picked up another three points against Celtic – if they’d just kept 11 men on the park.
And the determined defender insists the way his Buddies dealt with the title hopefuls in the first half on Sunday when the numbers were even shows they’re still a match for any team in the Premiership on their day.
Saints’ hopes of pulling off a second shock win over the Hoops at the SMiSA Stadium this season were all but dashed when Charles Dunne saw red for a clumsy foul on Kyogo Furuhashi just before half-time.
St Mirren still held a 1-0 lead at the break but Ange Postecoglou’s men eventually made easy work of the 10-man hosts by firing five second-half efforts past Trevor Carson to seal another heavy scoreline against the Paisley club this season.
Despite shipping 14 goals in their last three meetings with Celtic, Fraser is adamant his side have shown they can go toe to toe with the reigning league champs but must learn from their mistakes in “key moments”.
Fraser told Renfrewshire Live Sport: “It is sore because it is hard to lose that way. I think we can learn from it as well.
“These moments are going to come up again during the season and we will need to defend better. We will work on that and we will deal with it. We are well drilled and we know where we want to be on the pitch. It all comes from our shape within the team. We work hard on it in training every day.
“We believe in each other and if you were watching the first half you saw we can compete with anyone in the league.
“That’s what was annoying me at the end of the game. We have been in all of the games against Celtic and then key moments have happened.
“We don’t like shipping that many goals even if you are down to ten men. They started to play then and were moving it side to side.
“I thought we were comfortable and I’m sure if we kept 11 men on the park it would have been different. I know it is easy to say that, but I genuinely believe that.”
While Dunne has come under fire for the rash decision that led to his early bath, Fraser had sympathy for his defensive team-mate who had looked comfortable in the game up until that crucial point.
He backed his Buddie to come back and make up for his mistake, adding: “It is a split-second decision and every defender will find themselves in that moment at some point in their career.
“It is always easy to say afterwards, ‘what were you thinking?’
“But there will be no finger pointing at Dunney because he has been brilliant for us this season and will be from now until the end of the season. He apologised to the boys. We just take it on the chin and move on as we are all in it together.”
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