Kilmarnock manager Stuart Kettlewell bemoaned his side’s failure to switch on and refereeing “inconsistencies” after a 3-1 loss to Motherwell made it six defeats in succession.
Killie threatened a fightback following Tawanda Maswanhise’s first-half double when Scott Tiffoney netted four minutes after the restart.
But a VAR-assisted penalty allowed Apostolos Stamatelopoulos to restore the visitors’ two-goal cushion.
Referee Ryan Lee decided Lewis Mayo had fouled the Australian after being called to the monitor by video assistant David Dickinson.
“I’ve watched it several times, I’ve seen it from all different angles,” Kettlewell said. “I think it’s incredibly soft, but again that starts to become an excuse.
“I look at the contact on Bruce Anderson in the first half, and the foul’s given to Motherwell inside the penalty area. And this is the bit where we see so many inconsistencies.
“I can’t believe that that’s given as a foul to Motherwell for one. But if we’re going to then start laying claim that that’s a penalty for Stamatelopoulos, then I think we need to take a more forensic look into Bruce Anderson’s one.
“Again, I don’t want to keep making excuses, but I’ve had a look at Maswanhise’s first goal. It looks as if it comes off his hand, but they’re saying it’s inconclusive evidence.”
The former Motherwell boss added: “I sit here trying to justify why I felt that it was a pretty tight-knit game, but then the scoreline doesn’t reflect on that. So I take full ownership for that.
“But I feel that it’s those little flashes in games where we’re not showing the emotional intelligence to keep a clean sheet, and it’s given every team that we’re playing against real incentive.”
Kettlewell feels Killie’s problems are a “little bit psychological” as he relayed his exasperation over Maswanhise’s second goal, when Motherwell netted from a quickly taken corner for the second game running.
“We are probably in a position that when the game restarts we are a little bit glazed behind the eyes, we are not thinking sharp,” he said.
“We saw Motherwell do it against Aberdeen, we spoke about it, we understand it, but it’s that emotional intelligence to switch on.
“You did see a good reaction in the second half, but you’re two goals down, you’re giving yourself a mountain to climb, which is really difficult in this league.”
Motherwell boss Jens Berthel Askou felt the penalty award was “fair enough”.
The Dane said: “He goes to try and tackle, he misses the ball and is late, and trips AP, who if he doesn’t get that contact then he will have a free shot on goal.”
Askou added: “I’m always delighted with the points but even more delighted with the way we controlled the game for most of the time. A very, very difficult game to play.
“We dealt well with their direct play for the most part really well. It became more and more direct as the game went forward.
“There were some really, really good moments for us where we actually tried to play the way we want, with tempo, with movement.
“We knew it was going to be difficult to keep the same fluency in the game as we can on a good grass pitch, but we had enough moments where we really caused them problems.”
