Calderwood has lost 10 of his 15 matches in charge of Hibs

Hibernian manager Colin Calderwood was determined to take positives from his side's 2-0 defeat to Motherwell.

Two first-half goals gave the Steelmen their win, with Hibs' Merouane Zemmama missing a penalty for the visitors.

"The commitment was there and the level of footballing ability was definitely there," Calderwood told BBC Scotland.

"There are aspects of the game I enjoyed. Problems are there to be solved so that's what I'm looking forward to doing."

Defeat at Fir Park ended a miserable week for Hibs, who were knocked out of the Scottish Cup by Ayr United on Wednesday and now sit second-bottom of the Scottish Premier League, three points above Hamilton.

However, Calderwood is confident his players can turn things around.

"If you analyse the game, we've made more mistakes than them in terms of defending set plays and we've missed a super opportunity with a set play to get ourselves back into it. Those are the reasons that we've been beaten in the game," he said.

"The attitude? Excellent. The way they performed? Excellent. It was a commendable second half, I enjoyed watching my team play. You could see there was tremendous resolve in the dressing room to try and right this.

"In the background of all that, Callum Booth has had a first-team debut and given a very assured performance."

Calderwood also avoided directing criticism at Zemmama, saying of the spot-kick miss: "It's that singular moment when you don't complete a set play.

"He had a terrific performance, had a big influence. He also had probably our best opportunity prior to that when he's robbed and dribbled.

"The fact that you've been beaten 2-0, you can't say it's a good 2-0 defeat but there were things in that game that we'll do worse and end up taking points from."

Hibs now have to lift themselves for Wednesday's visit of reigning SPL champions Rangers but the Easter Road side faced a similar situation the last time the two sides met.

Having lost his first three games in charge, Calderwood took his team to Ibrox to face a Rangers side who at that time were yet to lose a domestic fixture and Hibs upset the odds with a 3-0 win.

"They've got to reproduce that level of performance and that level of commitment and it definitely didn't waiver in the game in a difficult situation, so that's good," said the former Scotland international.

"We've got to go again on Wednesday and we play Rangers, which is a terrifically difficult fixture but it's one where the stadium will have a good support and one thing they can't complain about was the way the boys went about their job today.

We'll take one more and then we'll hopefully take one more after that Colin Calderwood on potential signings

"Without being delighted, I quite enjoyed what they did with and without the ball."

Another item on Calderwood's agenda is strengthening his squad in the closing week and a half of the January transfer window.

"The deadline's approaching and we've got to do our work but we've sort of progressed and I think that you'll see a flurry of activity, not just at our club," he added.

"You can see in the last week and the last four or five days there have been more and more transfers when you switch on the computer.

"We'll take one more and then we'll hopefully take one more after that. It's very hard to say because it's never ever done until everything's completed in terms of signing the contract and getting everything over the line.

"We strive to give the boys in the dressing room a lift because they're desperate to make sure that we don't get involved in a relegation battle right to the end of the season.

"And we've got a chance to move away this week, we've got a home game, we've got the opportunity to win and then we go to Dundee United next Sunday. We're looking forward to it."

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