4pm

Yesterday's result: Motherwell 1, Celtic 1.

An injury time equaliser from substitute Darren Smith secured a point for Motherwell at Fir Park yesterday.  It was the very least we deserved from a match in which we outplayed the Champions for long periods, and had we taken even a couple of the numerous chances we created, we would surely have come away with all three points.

There were three changes to the side which won at Dunfermline on Boxing Day, with Jim Paterson, Steven McGarry and David Clarkson recalled in favour of Paul Quinn, Darren Smith and Calum Elliott respectively.

Both teams had opportunities in a strangely subdued first half, with Clarkson passing up two gilt edged chances for Motherwell early on.  It was the visitors who broke the deadlock just after the half-hour mark when Graeme Smith parried Nakamura's long range drive (which seemed to me to be going wide) straight to Riordan, and the ex-Hibs striker made no mistake from close range.  We should have been back on level terms shortly afterwards, but Celtic goalkeeper Boruc pulled off a stunning double save to deny Clarkson and then Foran.

Motherwell dominated much of the second half, with Scott McDonald missing probably our best opportunity when he shot straight at Boruc when clean through.  Celtic's only real attack after the interval saw Gravesen hit the inside of the post with a long range effort, but other than that Graeme Smith was a virtual spectator as Motherwell pressed forward at every opportunity.  Just when it looked like Celtic were going to steal the points, justice was finally done when McDonald took advantage of poor Celtic defending to setup Darren Smith to score from close range with virtually the last kick of the ball.

Had Celtic won yesterday it would have been nothing short of daylight robbery.  In fact, it was difficult to believe we were watching the team who are running away with the SPL and are in the last 16 of the Champions League, because yesterday they looked very ordinary indeed.  The point stretches the gap between ourselves and Dunfermline to 11 points, and sets us up nicely for the visit of Rangers on January 2 when hopefully we can go one better...

Team (4-4-2): Graeme Smith, Corrigan, Craigan, Reynolds, Paterson, McGarry (Darren Smith 77), Kerr, Fitzpatrick, Foran, Clarkson (Elliot 74), McDonald. 
Subs Not Used: Meldrum, Kinniburgh, Quinn, Connolly, Coakley.

Scorer: Darren Smith (90).

Booked: none.

Attendance: 9,769.

Maurice Malpas' post-match comments were as follows:
"I thought we deserved a win. The credit has to go to the players for battling away for 92 minutes or however long it was.  If we had had our shooting boots on we could have had two or three, especially in the second half.  I thought our final ball was even poor, at the start of the second half we had two or three chances to put the ball in the box and wasted them.  I am just delighted to take something from the game, the players deserved it.  We asked them before the game to get points instead of plaudits. They have got a point and plaudits as well."

Maurice Malpas has allowed two of our fringe players to go out on loan initially for one month, with Shaun Fagan joining Stenhousemuir and Bobby Donnelly heading for Stranraer .

Meanwhile, the Motherwell manager has dismissed reports that Southend have tabled an offer for Scott McDonald:
"This is completely untrue, and as far as I can see it is bad journalism. If it has come from Southend it is unprofessional from their end, and if it has come from an agent it also unprofessional.  The Directors are not encouraging any bids from anybody. We had enough hassle with Scott in the summer and we don’t want to go through it all again. We are all fed up talking about one player as three is more going on in the team. It also funny that this appears in the papers before we play the Old Firm."

On the Richie Foran situation, MM added:
"Once again I was amazed to hear that we had offered him a contract. All I asked Richie was if he wanted me to talk to the Directors, but he has asked to be allowed to concentrate on the games coming up, and leave any talks at the moment."

Finally, Malpas gave an update on the transfer situation involving Murphy, Keegan and Molloy:
"We are still in the hands of the FAI as is now dependant upon them faxing their International clearance on Monday morning to the SFA. Then the SFA have to pass this to the SPL to have the players registered on time for the Rangers game.  It will be good to get the three of them and give a bit of depth to the squad, and not be too worried about a minor knock. The players stripped on Tuesday were the only 18 fit players that we had."

Interesting article on Motherwell's attendances from the Daily Record last week.