Nikola Katic has admitted he had to be talked into signing for Plymouth Argyle by a persuasive Miron Muslic and is now very glad he listened to what the head coach had to say.

The 28-year-old initially turned down the chance to join the relegation-threatened Pilgrims on loan from Swiss Super League side FC Zurich towards the end of the winter transfer window after watching a couple of their games, including the 5-0 drubbing by Burnley, but Muslic was not about to give up on bringing the Bosnia and Herzegovina international defender to Home Park.

Katic was convinced by Muslic to make the move and his first two matches for Argyle could hardly have gone better for him, or the team, with a come-from-behind 2-1 Championship win against West Bromwich Albion followed by the epic 1-0 Emirates FA Cup fourth round triumph over Liverpool.

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"To be honest, at the start I didn't want (to sign for Argyle)," said Katic. "The club was in a bad position. I watched the games against QPR and Burnley, and I just said 'no' to the coach.

"We had a really honest conversation and everything, but he was really consistent, phoned me and I saw the way that he wants me it cannot be bad. It will be good for me, it will be good for him.

"The connection from the first day, the way he kept calling me, how much he praised me as a player and wanted to have me in his dressing room, so I decided to come and so far I can say I did the right thing and I'm really enjoying it here."

Katic arrived at Home Park to complete his loan move on the same day as Ukraine international defender Maksym Talovierov joined Argyle in a club record £1.7 million transfer from Austrian side LASK Linz.

The pair have already struck up an excellent partnership in central defence for the Pilgrims. "Me and Maxi came basically at the same minute to the hotel," said Katic, who played for Rangers under Steven Gerrard earlier in his career.

"In these 10 days we spend most of the time together so it's easy to click with him. From the other side, Pleggy (Julio Pleguezuelo) and Victor (Palsson) also are experienced guys with a good background at good clubs. The guys are doing well, it was easy to fit in.

"I cannot even call it training the first day we came in, it was just some tactics and straight into the game (against West Brom). I don't think it looked like we didn't know each other. So, yeah, all positive."

On Argyle's incredible win against Liverpool, when Katic was widely seen as the Pilgrims' man-of-the-match, he said: "We knew we had nothing to lose, playing against probably the best team in the world at the moment.

"We knew if we did well it would give us a massive boost for the upcoming fixtures, confidence and everything the team needs at the moment to try to achieve why we are here (to stay in the Championship)."

Although Argyle might not have had anything to lose against Liverpool, Katic did lose a tooth in the early stages of the FA Cup tie after a collision with captain Adam Randell.

"That's the one thing I lost, but I'm not really complaining," said Katic. "A tooth is easy to fix but if we lost or concede it wouldn't be possible to fix.

"The groundsman found it after the game. It's a miracle nobody step on it for 90 minutes because it happened at the start of the game. I still have it. I will probably keep it as a souvenir."

Katic believes his style of play as a tough, no-nonsense defender is suited to playing in this country. "Exactly, that's also why I went to Rangers," he said. "I like physical battles, I like headers, slides. The way the people here praise a clean sheet is not the same in Europe.

"In Europe if you get it it's good, but here it's a massive part. I really wanted to come back to the UK, for me it's the best country to play football and my wish is to stay here until the end of my career if possible."

Asked whether he would consider turning his loan into a permanent transfer to Argyle after the end of the season, he replied: "We just need to stay up and then it will be easy for everybody.

"As I said, I really love it here and it's a hell of a job in front of us to work and to achieve that, but that's the only main goal now, I don't really care about anything else, about the future.

"I felt the energy from the manager, from the team, they want to stay (in the Championship) and I think they belong there so I need to give 100 per cent of me every day to help them."

While beating Liverpool was a magnificent one-off achievement for Argyle, their priority continues to be fighting against relegation from the Championship.

Katic said: "Of course, Liverpool is a nice game to win and gives you a big boost and confidence but we know the position we are in and what we have to do. We all have just one goal. Our goal is not to win the FA Cup. Our goal is to stay in the Championship this season."

Argyle's win against Liverpool has been rewarded with a FA Cup fifth round away to Premier League champions Manchester City, which will be played on the weekend of March 1-2.

Katic said: "It's one of the biggest teams in the world but it's really far, far away, we have much more important things to focus on now. We will talk about it when the time comes for that."

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