St Mirren boss Stephen Robinson believes their Scottish Gas Scottish Cup win over Livingston is the perfect opportunity to reset their season.
The Buddies edged out their opponents on penalties in West Lothian, Malik Dijksteel converting the winning spot-kick to seal a 4-3 shootout success after the match had ended 1-1.
Roland Idowu opened the scoring after three minutes before Scott Arfield netted his first Livi goal to level shortly after, with neither side able to find the net for the remainder of the contest.
The two sides meet again in the Scottish Premiership on Tuesday night at Livingston’s Home of the Set Fare Arena, with Robinson challenging his players to be a top-six side over the next 12 games before the split.
He said: “What we’ve done is reset the season. You can get bogged down worrying about what happened the week before.
“We started with a cup competition and let’s see how far we can go in it.
Our league season is now 12 games before the split, so we start our league season again and we aim to be a top six side within those 12 games.”
He added: “It gives you a real goal as opposed to always looking back. You can’t change what’s happened. You can’t change the injuries or the decisions or the loss of form or the chances.
“I believe in looking forward. I believe in giving the players a goal and that comes from experience. They’ve done the first hurdle and now we’ve got another hard one again on Tuesday night.”
Livingston boss David Martindale felt his side controlled enough of the game to seal their passage to the fifth round but admitted Tuesday’s showdown was the more important game of the double-header.
He said: “I feel like a madman sometimes. At least this week, we lost the game through our own undoing. It was our fault, not the fault of an official or VAR.
“We were pretty good in the game. We controlled enough of the game, but we fell a bit short when it came to penalties.
“Tuesday is a big game for this club. I said I wanted to win both games, but, if I had to choose, I’d have chosen Tuesday.”
Martindale revealed the club are closing in on a new left-back and hopes the deal will be done before Tuesday’s game.
He added: “We’re bringing a left-back into the country. We know we’re light at left-back. He’ll be in the building tomorrow and it’s a six-figure sum.
“Calvin Ford has backed us and is building a group at the club. I felt when we came in this year we were probably a Championship team playing in the Premiership.
“I have no doubt in the next six to 12 months, we’ll be an established Premiership club with the infrastructure and resources.”
