Spot save was stroke of luck
Hazard dives the right way to help bail out Dark Blues
CONOR HAZARD admits he got lucky to rescue a point for Dundee in this battle for the play-offs.
The goalie, on loan from Celtic, pulled off a terrific stop to deny Ayr’s Aaron Muirhead from the spot.
Now both sides will do it all again tomorrow night at Dens in a quick double-header.
Hazard said: “It was all about a bit of luck.
“I knew from what was happening, I just picked a side and luckily it was the right one.
“From that performance I don’t think we were good enough and all the boys recognised that.
“It was a hard-fought game, the conditions weren’t great to be getting the ball down and playing.
“But we’re delighted to come away with a point and look forward to rectifying that on Tuesday.
“Our aim is to get into that play-off place and get promoted. Everyone gets on well, the management and players are brilliant, we’re a real unit and we stick together.”
The Dark Blues needed Hazard to bail them out in a poor game’s only real moment of note.
The contest had started with real promise and both sides looked lively in the opening exchanges. But after trading a couple of good early chances, the match fizzled out.
Dens full-back Cammy Kerr drew a decent stop from Ayr keeper Ross Doohan after a couple of minutes.
At the other end, Alan Forrest touched wide Aaron Drinan’s cross by a matter of inches.
But both sides struggled after that with chances at a premium in the testing conditions.
Michael Moffat should have done better when teed up by a Danny Harvie cross but sent his header straight at Hazard.
And for Dundee, Jordan McGhee saw his curling effort deflected onto the post.
Ayr thought they had the lead early in the second half but Moffat’s strike was ruled out for offside.
Then the same man won the penalty when he was chopped down from behind by Kerr in the box.
But Muirhead’s powerful effort was brilliantly saved by Hazard, who threw himself to his left to produce a top save.
It proved to be the game’s key moment as both sides laboured to create chances in the final 20 minutes.
A long-range drive from Ayr’s Stephen Kelly, that Hazard almost let slip from his grasp, was as near as the home side came to a late winner.
And a drive from Kane Hemmings that fizzed past could have stolen all three points for the Dark Blues.
Ayr boss Mark Kerr said: “We did enough to win.
“Now we’ve got Tuesday to go and deal with and it will be a tough double-header. It’s like a game of chess, we’ll tweak things and they’ll tweak things.”
Dens boss James McPake said: “It was difficult with the conditions and there wasn’t much football played.
“It was a great save from Conor and we showed a real desire not to concede.”