Talk of the town: St Mirren triumph at Hampden

Chief football writer

Monday 18 March 2013

DANNY Lennon admitted he had delivered the most important team-talk of his career to steer St Mirren to an historic Scottish Communities League Cup final victory over Hearts yesterday.

St Mirren 3 Hearts 2

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Michael Grant at Hampden

St Mirren lifted the trophy for the first time in their history after winning 3-2 in one of the most compelling recent cup finals. Ryan Stevenson scored twice for Hearts but, in between those early and late strikes, Esmael Goncalves, Steven Thompson and Conor Newton scored to deliver the cup to Paisley. Hearts missed several chances to win it themselves in Gary Locke's first game as permanent manager.

Although it was 1-1 at half-time, Lennon had feared his St Mirren players were letting the occasion get the better of them. Thompson and Newton scored early in the second half. "At half-time I got into the players a little bit. I reminded them that if they wanted to become legends then there was a game of football still to be played," he said."It was a big team-talk. There was a bit of emotion, some raised voices and some comforting words as well. Most importantly, though, we reminded them that these opportunities don't come around very often."Some players will go their full careers without getting to play at the national stadium in a national final. In reality, for some of our players, this might be their last. So my message was make sure it was a day they could remember for the rest of their lives. They gave us that and they gave us all a memory to cherish for the rest of our lives. We got off to a fantastic start in the second half and got ourselves into a comfortable lead. But I never felt the game was out of sight. Hearts put us under a great deal of pressure."St Mirren had around 17,000 fans in the 44,036 crowd and Lennon praised both sets of supporters. "I thought the Hearts fans brought a lot to the game as well as our own," he said. "It was certainly the people's cup final. I'm also thrilled for the board, who had the belief in me to give me this opportunity, and I'm absolutely delighted that my staff and my players could deliver this for them. "At 3-1 up I was kicking every ball and winning every header. I've never won as many headers in my puff. I'm very proud and emotional. It's really just sinking in." Vladimir Romanov, Hearts' majority shareholder, attended his first game since last season's Scottish Cup final defeat of Hibs but there was no glory for him this time. "It's a sore one," said Gary Locke, the Hearts manager. "Myself, my staff and all the players are really hurting. It was a game I felt we would have gone on to win if only we had got the second goal. We had a few chances but in the end it wasn't meant to be."The players never gave up and that's the type of commitment and desire that's required. I was just disappointed with them for the first 10 minutes of the second half because we didn't get going at all, and that's cost us."

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Talk of the town: St Mirren triumph at Hampden

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