A BITTER NIL
United gutted to draw blank but boss says that proves progress
Micky Mellon watched his side carve out their sixth goalless draw of the season but insisted he’ll take that as his side continues to find its feet in the top flight.
United were denied all three points thanks to a sensational 28th-minute save by Ryan Fulton to deny Ian Harkes from point blank range.
That was enough to give Accies a deserved share of the spoils in their annual fight to beat the drop.
Mellon admitted he was frustrated to have not gone back to Tayside with the victory instead of another point from another stalemate.
He said: “You have to be honest and say that if you’re going to be more successful, you have to be taking three points in some of those games.
“We won’t allow people to put us under pressure by saying we should be getting better results in a league where we’ve just arrived in.
“It shows how far we’ve come when we go into the dressing-room and everyone’s disappointed that we’ve not take three points at a place like Hamilton.
“We have to keep building bit by bit, and we are.”
Right from the start it looked like another tight encounter.
In fact, the only real point of note was ref Greg Aitken getting smacked in the face by an Accies clearance but he recovered without treatment.
Neither keeper had a save to make in the first 20 minutes but United’s Benji Siegrist should have been asked a question by David Moyo after the striker was found just inside the box by Lee Hodson. The Accies man elected to square the ball rather than shoot and a decent opportunity fizzled out.
When Fulton was called into action, the Accies keeper produced a superb save to deny Harkes, who got on the end of Dillon Powers’ cross but his header was touched over.
Ten minutes later, Callum Smith fired over after good work from Ross Callachan and Accies ended the half in the ascendancy with Siegrist forced into a decent scrambled save from a Callachan free-kick.
After the break Siegrist was forced into a smart save from Hodson while a minute later, United claimed for a penalty when Harkes went down but ref Aitken was unimpressed and waved play on.
Siegrist then dived full length to turn aside a Hakeem Odoffin effort from the edge of the box and, in the end, both teams were left with something to show for their efforts.