Injuries hampered Saints - McInnes

Last updated : 20 March 2010 By BBC Sport

McInnes said: "We never carried the same threat we normally do but circumstances dictated that.

"The way Celtic keep the ball, it's physically demanding. There was a lot conspiring against us in terms of injury but Celtic were worthy winners."

The loss of Deuchar after quarter of an hour required an early reshuffle for McInnes before goals by Josh Thompson and Georgios Samaras either side of a Robbie Keane penalty gave the hosts victory.

"We lost Kenny Deuchar when we were already four strikers down for the game," said the Saints manager.

"But young Stephen Reynolds went on and that's a positive. He's just turned 17 and he came on and battled away well, playing in a position that's slightly alien to him over on that left-hand side.

"Steven Milne, our last striker standing, so to speak, was feeling his hamstring and had to come off as well, more as a precaution and we've got two or three boys out there patched up a bit.

"Murray Davidson limped through the last 25 minutes of the game and we had one or two who played who haven't played in a long time."

The Perth side's next outing is a home match against Scottish Premier League bottom club Falkirk and McInnes is keen to bolster St Johnstone's chance of achieving a top-six place.

He said: "In an ideal world, we would've liked to have really freshened the team up against Celtic, that was always my intention.

"You're not giving up the Celtic game but you're saying our priority's Tuesday night without question and we've got another massive one on the Saturday against Hamilton.

There are five games now left before the split. I think we have to go and win possibly three or four of those

Derek McInnes on Saints' top six chances

"So, if we're prioritising things then Tuesday was seen as the bigger game for us but we thought we could come here and be resilient and go and compete and hopefully carry a threat to get something.

"But we never had the luxury to freshen things up. We've got a few walking wounded and we need to assess everything and see where we are and try to pick a team for Tuesday.

"There are five games now left before the split. I think we have to go and win possibly three or four of those. Hearts got a great result today.

"First thing's first, we need to make sure we get away from the bottom team again. For us we've got our opportunity to do that on Tuesday and if we can get a win, we've got three games at home out of the five.

"Hopefully we can take full advantage of the opportunity we have on Tuesday but we're up against a team who are fighting and scrapping so it'll be difficult."

Source: BBC Sport

Source: BBC Sport