Tom Taiwo aims to do himself proud in Scottish Cup clash

Tom Taiwo says he will be playing for pride as well as glory in Saturday’s Scottish Cup Final.

The Falkirk midfielder was part of the Hibs side which crashed 3-0 to a Gary Hooper-inspired Celtic in the 2013 showpiece.

And while he accepts it was the right result, the manner of the defeat still rankles.

“Even if you are going to lose, you want to put in a performance where you can walk off the pitch with your head held high and knowing you’ve given a good account of yourself,” said the Englishman.

“That didn’t happen in 2013, which was a big disappointment.

“Individually everybody wanted to win, but as a team unit I don’t think we showed any glimpses of the way we could play.

“The manager did everything he could to prepare us, but I’m not sure how many of us actually thought we could go out and win the game.

“Listen, it is difficult when you’re playing Celtic. They’re the best team in the SPFL by a long way.

“Sometimes, when you are playing against a bigger team, you’ve got to accept that you’re not going to be able to play at your maximum for the full 90 minutes

“But you want to be in the contest fighting right until the last minute.

“As a team unit, I don’t think we showed any glimpses of the way we could play.

“In the first 10 minutes we had a couple of chances, and then we kind of just fell away and it all became a little bit tepid.

“We lost three sloppy goals and we didn’t really apply ourselves the way we know we can.”

Two years on, Taiwo is confident his current side won’t suffer any such big game freeze against Inverness Caledonian Thistle.

“This time we know we can go and win that game and that’s the key thing for me,” he said.

“We have got a lot of young lads here who play with no fear. And we all know that on our day we can beat any team not just in our league, but the league above.”