Woods: We won’t let up on the aggro

GARY WOODS today backed Hamilton to bounce back from their opening Ladbrokes Premiership defeat to Aberdeen – by continuing their winning run against the Pittodrie club at the Superseal Stadium tomorrow night.

The English keeper pulled off some outstanding saves against Derek McInnes’s side on Sunday, but he was unable to prevent Martin Canning’s side from slumping to a 2-0 loss.

Yet the 26-year-old played in the twin 1-0 victories Accies recorded against their north-east rivals at home in the 2016/17 campaign and he believes they can pull off another upset in their Betfred Cup last-16 tie.

He said. “We will be confident going into that game that we can get something.

“I don’t know if they don’t like the surface, it could be a number of factors. We’ve got good home form against them and we’ll be looking to take that into Wednesday.”

Hamilton’s hopes of getting a result at Pittodrie were effectively ended in the second half when Xavier Tomas, the French centre-half who was making his league debut, was ordered off for a second bookable offence.

But Woods, like his manager Canning, felt the referee allowed himself to be influenced by the 15,165-strong crowd at Pittodrie and stressed his side would continue to take a physical approach.

He said: “There were a few tackles going in. A few of the boys put their foot in and we paid the price. Ultimately, it got one of our boys sent off, which put us on the back foot.

“But a couple of them were dubious fouls. They didn’t seem to get many bookings themselves because there was some persistent fouling on their side.

“You wouldn’t like to think the crowd influenced the referee.

“But it can help the home team when they are up roaring but it is part and parcel away from home.

“They get a lot more through the gates than us.”