Adam Frizzell says Airdrie’s 4-0 Scottish Cup defeat at Dundee can’t derail their fight against Championship relegation.
The Diamonds were undone in a first-half demolition at Dens Park as Dee ran riot to book their place in the quarter-finals.
Clark Robertson opened the scoring in 13 minutes, and Lyall Cameron notched a double, either side of Oluwaseun Adewumi’s strike for 3-0.
Airdrie skipper Frizzell admits his side were taught a harsh lesson on Tayside, but it can’t halt a run of three straight wins prior to that.
Frizzell said: “We didn’t turn up in the first 30 minutes, and against a good team you get punished.
“We gave the ball away on the edge of our box for three of their four goals, I think, and that can’t happen against better players, because you will be punished.
“Dundee were on the back of a couple of bad results [6-0 defeats to Celtic and Hearts] and we wanted to come here and keep it tight in the first 10 or 15 minutes – that’s what the gaffer said for us to do.
“I think we got away from that, and we were punished for it. I don’t think we carried out the game-plan.
“We were nowhere near good enough for the first half-an-hour, the game got away from us, early on, and it then became very difficult, when you’re playing against good players, to try and get a foothold in the game.”
Airdrie fared better in the second half, but the damage was done by then, and Frizzell himself passed up a chance to get a goal.
He said: “We competed well and should have ‘won’ the second half. I’ve got to score, I had a great chance.
“But we can only take that into next week, now. We need to put this behind us.
“We were underdogs today it was a bonus, coming up here, and we’ve done well to get ourselves in this position –but we had to be so much better.”