Stephen Robinson saw his decision to put faith in the carefree attitude of youth well and truly vindicated after David Turnbull earned Motherwell a second crucial win in four days.
The 19-year-old set Motherwell on their way to victory over St Mirren on Wednesday and he produced a brilliant second goal in four days to see off Dundee at Fir Park.
The midfielder’s 25-yard strike into the top corner in the 69th minute earned a 1-0 win and moved Motherwell eight points clear of the bottom side.
“He’s a talented boy,” Motherwell manager Robinson said. “We won’t get too carried away yet, he is still in the very early stages of his career. But he has a massive talent. He needs to be managed, as all young boys do, and we have a few more to come as well.
“I don’t think there was ever any doubt about his temperament, he is so unfazed by things.
“Sometimes when things aren’t going well, the younger boys are very unaffected by it. The older boys worry a little bit more because they have been part of it and know the consequences. David has gone in with a freedom, played with a freedom.”
Turnbull was involved in much of Motherwell’s better attacking play as they created the bulk of the chances. But Dundee showed decent attacking intent and pushed Motherwell back in the closing stages.
It was a fourth consecutive defeat for new boss Jim McIntyre without scoring a goal but he said: “That’s a big improvement on the last three games. What let us down was our final ball. We got into some great positions, put a lot of crosses in but we didn’t have many with a lot of quality on show.
“I thought we defended stoutly at times, far far better than it’s been, up against a side that like to put a lot of balls into the box as well. We had a right go at it at the end but Motherwell defended well.”
Dundee lost both their starting centre-backs to injury with Andy Boyle leaving the field on a stretcher to leave Dundee with 10 men in stoppage-time.
McIntyre said: “Andy’s got a gash in his knee, so he’ll be okay, he just needs a few stitches. Darren O’Dea took a knock and there was a bit of blurred vision. So we couldn’t take any chances there. He was struggling to see and tried to continue.
“That wasn’t great (losing him) because it upset that a wee bit. And when you think about how the goal happened as well, one of our centre-backs has got to get to the ball. But before that we are in good possession in the wider area and we get robbed.
“We make a poor decision when it’s on to play a forward pass and they take a quick throw-in when we are caught with men up the park. Just a wee bit of naivety there has come back to bite us.”
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