Aberdeen winger Niall McGinn believes Dean Campbell has learned a valuable lesson after the teenager was sent off for the first time in his professional career on Saturday.
With the Dons leading 1-0 thanks to Curtis Main’s opener, they were forced to play the final hour of the game without Campbell after the midfielder was dismissed for his second bookable offence for failing to retreat 10 yards and allow County to take a free kick.
With the extra-man advantage the Staggies hit back to inflict a fourth consecutive home league defeat on Derek McInnes’ side, with Billy Mckay’s double giving County only their second away win of the campaign.
McGinn said: “The red card was just one those ones you can’t do much about as Iain Vigurs was just cute and smart to take the free kick knowing Deano was standing there.
“It’s one of those situations that he has to learn from as he is a young lad just making his way in the game.
“He needs to just turn away and get back into shape but he’s got the second yellow card and the referee is not going to change that.”
Despite playing for an hour minus their team-mate McGinn believes the defeat was unfair on his side.
He said: “It’s very, very frustrating coming off the back of a very good result in midweek as we just wanted to kick on.
“We also played well against Celtic and we wanted to maintain the momentum of some good performances and results over the last 10 days.
“It was a strong showing against Celtic then there was the grit and determination to come back twice against Kilmarnock to get into the cup quarter final.
“Going down to 10 men so early didn’t help but I thought we were still good enough to see the game out.”
The latest loss allowed Motherwell to reclaim third spot in the Premiership from Aberdeen and with the Steelmen also having a game in hand on his side McGinn knows there is not much margin for error remaining.
He said: “It’s been frustrating for everyone as we have always been a good team at home but we have struggled lately. Teams are going away with points and we have to get back to winning at Pittodrie sooner rather than later.
“The games are running out and there have been chances for us to close the gap between us and Motherwell which we did but they are ahead again now.
“We are not going to get many more opportunities to overtake them.”