Kilwinning Rangers' Scottish Cup late equaliser felt like a defeat, admits Rutherglen Glencairn boss

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Willie Harvey admits Rutherglen Glencairn’s historic first venture into the Scottish Cup felt like a defeat after Kilwinning Rangers netted a stoppage time equaliser.First Division Glens were on course for a cup upset when they led their West of Scotland Premier Division opponents 2-1 going into the final seconds, with two goals in two minutes from man of the match Jack McIlveen turning the game on its head after Mark Millar had broken the deadlock after 18 minutes.However, as the clock ticked down it looked ominous for Glens when McIlveen was forced off injured with Harvey having made all three permitted substitutes.And in stoppage time the hosts’ resolve was broken when Millar fired home a free-kick to earn Rangers a replay at Buffs Park this Saturday.Gutted Harvey said: “It felt like a defeat getting so close to getting through.“But 30 minutes into the game losing 1-0, if you had offered me a draw then I’d have bitten your hand off because we just didn’t perform at all during that time.“My goalkeeper, Matt McGinley, kept us in it with two good saves and if we’d lost another goal at that point [1-0] I think we would have gone out.“That’s not definite because I do know our boys have got a good fighting spirit and they step up when adversity kicks in, but it would have been very hard to come back from 2-0 down against a team like Kilwinning.“It was still hard to take the equaliser because we were so close.

I was looking at my watch, I knew it was the 90th minute and we gave away a free-kick that could have been avoided.“Our defender has tried to nip in and steal the ball instead of just standing up to it, but I’m not going to blame anyone for that, it’s part and parcel of football.“In the second half we caused Kilwinning