6pm

We were beaten 2-0 by Celtic at Fir Park in this afternoon's televised match.  This was our fourth consecutive defeat and fourth consecutive match without a goal, yet it was night and day compared to the previous three losses and we made Celtic fight every inch of the way for the three points.

In the continuing absence of David Partridge, Martyn Corrigan once again filled in at centre-half with Paul Quinn replacing Jason Dair at right-back.  The youngster went on to have an outstanding game and would easily be my Motherwell man of the match.

We got off to the worst possible start by gifting Celtic a goal after only four minutes, when Thompson's deflected cross caused panic in the defence and Hartson fired home at the back post.  It was all Celtic at this point and we were hanging on for dear life, yet we gradually improved and Derek Adams was very unlucky not to equalise when his free-kick came back off the bar with Douglas beaten.  Adams went close again with another free-kick before Clarkson went down in the box and the ref awarded a somewhat soft penalty.  However, Adams' spot-kick was well saved by Douglas in the Celtic goal.  The heads certainly didn't go down after this and we finished the first half strongly, with Clarkson missing a guilt-edged opportunity shortly before the interval.  We were extremely unfortunate to go in at half-time 1-0 down.

We started the second half well and Burns forced Douglas into action with a cross/shot, however the game was virtually killed off as a contest when Celtic doubled their lead slightly against the run of play after 70 mins.  Petrov went down rather easily at the edge of the box and when the ref awarded a free-kick, Thompson stepped up to curl a superb shot round the defensive wall and past Marshall at his near post.  We didn't give up and Adams had a long range effort tipped over the bar, but Celtic held on for a 2-0 win.

It's difficult to criticise today's performance as the players battled well and gave their all for 90 mins, with one notable exception.  Stephen Pearson yet again did not seem to be interested and his commitment must surely be called into question.  That aside, a repeat of the fighting qualities we showed today will surely bring an end to our current wretched run of form sooner rather than later.

Team (4-4-2): Marshall, Quinn, Corrigan, Craigan, Hammell, Lasley, Adams, Leitch (Dair 76), Pearson, Burns, Clarkson
Subs not used: Corr, Fagan, Wright, Fitzpatrick.

Booked: Craigan, Lasley.

Attendance: 10,513

Speaking after the match, Terry Butcher admitted that the penalty we were awarded was somewhat debatable(!):
"I didn't think it was a penalty to start with.  But I would have taken it had we scored.  Had that gone in then I don't know whether we would have gone on to win.  But I was very pleased with my players' performance. We've played worse than that and won games.  We are hitting the post and missing penalties and things aren't going for us in front of goal but we pushed Celtic all the way."

The draw for the 3rd Round of the Scottish Cup was made this afternoon, and Motherwell will travel to face St Johnstone at McDairmid Park on Saturday, January 10.

Before today's game, Terry Butcher hit out at the speculation that Stephen Pearson will sign a pre-contract agreement with Celtic next month:
"I wouldn't like a player to sign a pre-contract agreement because mentally he'd be with the other club.  It's the same with someone signing him then loaning him back for the rest of the season.  With respect you just don't know what a player's commitment would be in those circumstances.''

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