Tollcross Thistle boss eyes another trophy after Hampden shoot-out heroics

Jubilant Tollcross Thistle boss Alan McKay has urged his players not to over-celebrate their stunning Scottish Amateur Cup triumph as they have their eyes on more silverware this season.

Hampden Park witnessed one of its greatest ever comebacks under the lights on Wednesday night as Tollcross lifted the Scottish Cup for the first time in their 17-year existence, with a penalty shootout victory over Drumchapel.

Tollcross had went in at half-time 3-0 behind but fought back to level in the second half, with Stewart O’Neill’s 97th minute penalty sending the 2019/20 final to extra-time.

“In the first half, the mistakes we were making and our quality on the ball – I was thinking, ‘what is going on?’ We hadn’t played like that ever,” said McKay. “I do think there was an element of nerves, and to give Drumchapel credit, they played quite well.

“I said to them at half-time to go and get a goal and get us back in the game. It was relatively conserved, it was all about getting back to doing what we do best in an attacking and defensive sense, because we were doing the polar opposite of what has been a good season.

“After that the players dug each other out – the technical players were saying the hardworking players weren’t good on the ball and the hardworking players were saying the technical players were being lazy. There’s no getting away from it, we went in there at half-time all embarrassed and hurting. The aim was to get our pride back as a minimum.”

McKay continued: “My phone has been nonstop and the social media notifications through the roof. It’s really nice and you appreciate it, but now the thought process is on our semi-final with Danderhall on Saturday.

“We will get the photos, videos and all these things, and we will be able to look back on them, but to be honest I don’t think it has even sunk in for some of the players.

Tollcross Thistle manager Alan McKay celebrates with the Scottish Amateur Cup.

“We were on the bus back to Edinburgh and it was an amazing feeling but we’ve got ourselves in a really good position for some other things and you can’t really stop; the next four to six weeks are going to be pretty busy, hopefully we can add some more trophies to the list.”