DICKER IS A BIT OF A DAB HAND
Skipper can fill breach for Killie after settling dour battle against Buddies
GARY DICKER jumped to the rescue with his second goal in two weeks to put Kilmarnock third in the Premiership and is now ready to drop back into the heart of the defence to keep their resurgence going strong.
The Rugby Park captain headed home the winner with 12 minutes to play in a stodgy, hard-fought encounter before being redeployed in the heart of the rearguard after Dario del Fabro had been taken off with a suspected hamstring injury.
Killie had already lost their other centre-back Stuart Findlay to the same problem midway through the opening 45 and may well have to keep Dicker where he finished this encounter alongside Alex Bruce when they go to Motherwell on Wednesday night.
It a prospect that leaves the Irish midfielder unfazed. His contribution at the back towards the end of this one helped rack up an eighth clean sheet in 10 games since an abysmal defeat at Hamilton in early August that left manager Angelo Alessio under severe pressure.
He has helped the squad dig deep into their reserves of character since then, though, and is ready to do whatever he needs to do to bite and scratch his way to another result at Fir Park.
‘I have filled in at centre-back a few times and we have enough players and enough experience here to deal with injuries,’ he said.
‘We did start (the season) badly. We did deserve to get told we weren’t good enough and have come out the other side, but we can’t get ahead of ourselves.
‘We knew what we have in this dressing room. We have bundles of character and we lost big figures such as Kris Boyd, Jordan Jones and Greg Taylor. That can have an effect, but we’ve pulled ourselves together. It probably took the lads who hadn’t been here a little longer to buy into what we have been doing.
‘I’ll take two goals as I waited long enough to get one, but you have to find a way to win no matter how.’
If anything, Saints looked the more dangerous in this often-grim tussle with a squandered opportunity 20 minutes from time proving a turning point.
Fresh from seeing team-mate Danny Mullen have a header tipped wide by Laurentiu Branescu, Tony Andreu moved onto a pass from Jon Obika that caught the home defence square, but slid his effort wide of the goalkeeper’s right-hand post.
A late tackle from Dario del Fabro after the shot had been released resulted in Andreu eventually hobbling off the park to make way for Junior Morias. And just eight minutes later, Killie made him pay for his profligacy.
Having won the corner from Paul McGinn, substitute Chris Burke delivered a deep cross and Dicker lost his marker Sam Foley to send a well directed header back across the keeper and into the net.
In truth, Killie could have won by more. With just three minutes left, Burke got on the end of a deflected El Makrini effort, but was put under just enough pressure from Paul McGinn to put it wide from close range.
‘We have had other games like today’s — we’ve stayed compact then had the possibility to score,’ said home boss Alessio. ‘But we have to improve because we found it difficult to create chances.’
For visiting manager Jim Goodwin, the problems were familiar ones. His team was hard to break down, but couldn’t put the ball in the pokey.
‘A draw would have been fair,’ he said. ‘I would have taken a 0-0 back down the road for our first point away from home this season, but I am gutted for the players because they put a hell of a lot into it.
‘It is down to a simple set-play we should defend better. We had the best chance when Tony was through on goal and, on another day, he’d probably slot it home — but I give credit to Del Fabro for a decent recovery run that put Tony under enough pressure.’
Saints also saw a claim for a penalty turned down towards the end of the first half, believing Mullen had been held by Bruce.
‘There is a similar free-kick given five or six minutes later, but it certainly isn’t the referee’s fault we haven’t won,’ said Goodwin.