Peter Leven was pleased with the character of his players who had to dig deep to beat Motherwell after the demands of last week’s titanic Scottish Cup semi-final against Celtic.

“We looked a wee bit tired to start with, I thought we were trying to force the passes. But when we do play it quick between the lines, we look like a really good team. We didn’t do enough in their box but I’m happy with the clean sheet and the three points.

“We upped the tempo second half. We never punched it through the lines quick enough first half, never made enough options for the guy on the ball. So we needed to up the tempo and they showed that second half.

Having beaten the Steelmen, Leven insists there’s no time for the Dons to rest on their laurels.

“I’ve set a challenge for them, I want to finish seventh. Our first two games in the split are at home and I want to take advantage of that. We did the first part of that today. Now we have to carry on.”