St Johnstone need to prove that being out-fought by their opposition was a one-off for them this season, according to Cammy MacPherson.
The Perth midfielder dismissed the idea that Saints took their third Premier Sports Cup group fixture lightly after getting two wins under their belt.
But he knows that a repeat of the horror show in the 3-2 midweek defeat to Alloa will not be tolerated.
And that means a big improvement is needed when East Fife visit McDiarmid Park on Saturday, whether that proves to be enough to progress to the last 16 or not.
“I’ve been playing for long enough to know that when you come to places like this it’s not going to be easy,” said MacPherson.
“It was always likely to be one of the toughest games in the group.
“They’ve got experienced players who got in about us and we didn’t deal with that.
“It wasn’t good enough at all.
“We got a good reaction from them opening the scoring by going straight up the pitch to equalise.
“Then we basically handed them two goals – two really sloppy goals.
“It’s just not good enough.
“We knew it was going to be tough.
“They’ve got good, experienced players and the pitch obviously doesn’t help.
“You have to battle and hope that you’ve got better quality in your team to get the result. We didn’t show that.
“We now have to beat East Fife convincingly and see what happens.
“We need to roll our sleeves up now and show a reaction.”
Essel lesson
Saints’ task was made harder by Aaron Essel’s straight red card just after the hour-mark.
It will hopefully be a case of lesson learned, when the 18-year-old returns from suspension.
“It can’t happen,” said MacPherson. “Especially right in front of the linesman.
“The linesman said that he stamped on him.
“You can’t get away with it. They’re never going to let you away with a stamp.
“We didn’t need it.”
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