Rob Roy boss happy to win ugly as title race hots up

But as the Super League Premier Division title race approaches its crucial run-in, the Rabs boss would gladly settle for ‘ugly’ wins between now and the end of the season.

Rabs head for Largs Thistle on Saturday looking to turn the heat up on title rivals Auchinleck Talbot, Beith and Glenafton who are all otherwise engaged on Scottish Junior Cup duty.

Maxwell has already described the match as a “must win” for his team - but says he doesn’t think he’ll have to stress the point to his players.

He said: “As much as I’ll be motivating them I really think that the motivation should be coming from within. They know what’s at stake and what they’re going for.

“They recognised it a couple of weeks ago against Hurlford when they were really disappointed with a draw and I could see the fire in their eyes.

“But they’ve got to understand that they’ve got to perform every week. Teams that win league titles perform to a level every week. So far they’ve done that, in a tough league they’ve performed in near enough every game.

“Probably the poorest performance of the season was against Beith in the league, but you can accept that. Teams that win leagues have poor performances but the standard has got to be high. They recognise what they have to do.

“They understand where we’re at and they’ve worked hard to get to where we’re at. It’s really down to them to keep performing at the level they’ve been at.

“If they do that they’ll not be far away but you can’t let your performances and expectations dip. If you let them dip 10 per cent in this competitive league it will cost you and you can’t get it back.

“You play as if every game’s your last now. We’ve got 10 games to go and 10 ugly wins would do me.”