STEPHEN Robinson urged his Motherwell players to make themselves heroes and go on to lift the Scottish Cup.

The Lanarkshire club secured a place in their second cup final of the season with a rousing 3-0 victory over Aberdeen at Hampden yesterday, with a Curtis Main double and a strike from Ryan Bowman doing the damage.

Twenty-seven years have come and gone since Motherwell last paraded the oldest trophy in association football through the streets. That day it was icons such as Stevie Kirk, David Cooper and Phil O’Donnell who had the honour.

Robinson, who will watch from the stand today to see if it is Celtic or Rangers they will face on May 19, believes history can be made by his team.

“I used the analogy about the Northern Ireland squad that got to the Euros. All we heard was about the 1982 and ’86 squad. It’s all they talked about and rightly so, they deserved it. But now there are new heroes in town with the squad that qualified.

“These boys have such a terrific chance. They are honest boys who aren’t earning millions of pounds but give you everything. I’d love to see it.

“The feeling of today, and what we felt against Rangers [in the Betfred Cup semi-final], in comparison to what we felt against Celtic [2-0 loss in the final], you do think about it and it had a knock-on impact on us for three or four weeks.

“We know what we want to feel after it. The boys are driven and they are driven in training. I cringe sometimes as I have my head in my hands at how competitive they are, but they can’t play any other way.

“We don’t fear anybody but we are well aware the quality Celtic have and the threat Rangers have going forward. They’ve scored a lot of goals.

“Whoever we get will be a tough game but we are certainly motivated after the last final.”

It was Louis Moult who was the goal hero in Motherwell’s last semi-final in a 2-0 win over Rangers, but it was a different No 9 who stole the headlines this time in Curtis Main. Moult’s replacement took his tally for the season to eight, and Robinson added: “He epitomises everything that we are about. Him and Bowman up front were outstanding and I wouldn’t fancy playing against them.

“They are strong, physical and they give you everything. They push people around but I’ll tell you what, they’ve got some quality about them too and you guys sometimes miss that. They set the tone for us today, they did right from the start.”

For Derek McInnes, there was no sugar-coating what was a truly galling afternoon. He was without Graeme Shinnie, Shay Logan and Kenny McLean but the Aberdeen manager was blunt about responsibility needing to be taken both on his part and that of the players.

“While I said I wouldn't use the players that were suspended as an excuse, it was clear today that we struggled to replace like for like,” he said.

"I don't take responsibility in terms of today's performance as me and my staff have worked really hard and prepared the team really well and you can't always as a staff and as a manager legislate for mistakes.

"Where I take responsibility is with the recruitment in both windows. Sometimes you don't know until you know and today smacked me between the eyes that the strength of the squad wasn't good enough.

"Sometimes that happens when key players are missing. Every team has key players who are pivotal to what the team produces week in week out.

"We've had a strong league campaign again and the players deserve credit for that but when it came to it today and there was an opportunity there we didn't have the answers that a club like Aberdeen should have.

"That's where I take the responsibility in terms of putting together a squad that I think can take care of every eventuality. But today and in other games this season the recruitment and the decisions we've made in both windows sometimes have come back to bite us."