MARK ROBERTS was made to eat his words as Connah’s Quay Nomads shocked Scottish Premiership outfit Kilmarnock.

Roberts, manager of Queen’s Park, who were dumped out of the Scottish Challenge Cup by Nomads last season, hoped that Kilmarnock would beat Andy Morrison’s men 10-0 in the first qualifying round.

“It will probably be six but I’d like ten. The one thing I can guarantee is that Kilmarnock will have too much for them,” said Roberts. “Kilmarnock will beat Connah’s Quay, no problem.”

But those words came back to haunt Roberts as Morrison’s men overturned a 2-1 first-leg deficit to triumph 3-2 on aggregate.

Ryan Wignall, who was later sent-off, headed Nomads into the lead at Rugby Park, before Callum Morris secured a memorable win from the spot after Stuart Findlay had been dismissed.

And Morrison took aim at Roberts after securing a second qualifying round tie with Partizan Belgrade - the first-leg at Belle Vue on Thursday.

“Going into the game I’m looking in the tunnel and I reckon eight of their players are physically bigger and taller than my players,” said Morrison. “But they will come off the pitch and say ‘they were aggressive, they were physical’. That’s not what you see in the tunnel, but when you get on the pitch with these boys they grow another two or three inches.

“That comes from myself, Craig (Harrison) and Jay (Catton) instilling that belief in them that we can achieve anything if we stick together and we are men.

“And that’s important - you have to be men to win games of football, which brings me on to comments I saw in the Scottish press.

“Before the game they were definitely going to beat us 6-0, but he hoped it would be 10-0, but the point to that is that men don’t roll over and die and lose 6-0.

“Men stand up and be counted, soft people roll over - my players don’t do that.”

Morrison also feels he and Nomads deserve more credit for their impressive work on the domestic and European scene.

It’s the second time in four Europa League campaigns that Nomads have progressed.

Morrison said: “If Connah’s Quay had brought in AC Milan’s Under-23 coach and he was called Andreas Morrisiani and he won 2-0 here, everybody would be saying ‘we need to take a look at that performance and see exactly how he did it’.

“But it’s not, it’s Andy Morrison so it’s down to being an aggressive team and organised, but it’s not and I know there is far greater detail to how we go about things against superior opposition.

“Maybe people will start taking a bit more notice.”